Standing Sex
by Asimosama
Summary: Whoever said computer hackers had a mutated 'sanity gene' could not have been more correct. Liang Xiaoxiao is unemployed, uneasily amused, and out to hack the world. Unfortunately, L is the only one in her way. L x OC.
1. Chapter 1: Hack Me

**Chapter One: HACK ME  
**

* * *

_5 December, 1999_

L felt his attention jerked by a scene unfolding at the opposite corner of the café, despite his efforts to keep his attention on the laptop before him. It wasn't like he was distracted, or wanted to be. His subconscious had simply broken out his grasp and had decidedly absorbed itself in something he was against.

Thirty minutes. Two thousand and forty-seven numerical and alphabetical characters, including the pound or space key. Hit delete twice. Hit backspace once. Haven't cleared yet.

The homeless woman wasn't texting or calling. Her typing had no patterns, so she couldn't have been playing a game. Could she be in the middle of a ploy or prank, where she was to be caught texting?

Still, even those pretending to text would subconsciously favor certain keys, resulting in a normal distribution of character-versus-hit. Her typing was erratic, random, and unnaturally disordered.

L felt a slight and foreign hint of irritation.

It had been a years since he had a truly challenging case—a few mass murderers, some strange plots to assassinate random presidents of obscure democratic states, and a perverted killer every now and then. None could merit 'interesting'. Even the longest case, which took him a relatively record-breaking three minutes and twenty-seven seconds, was barely waxing engaging.

And here, ironically enough, was the internationally renowned detective: wasting away in a café to stalk an unfortunate and oblivious homeless woman because all his job was too horridly undemanding.

_"What is she doing? What could she be trying to pull off, L?" _

He could feel the question bubbling in his fingers and wrapping around his toes. The sensation only vexed him more.

And the fact that his boredom was at last alleviated by a stranger pressing her definitely-not-manicured fingers on a typical cell phone pad only smacked home the notion that he must have been very, very fed up to be suddenly so easily entertained.

The thought that he was so, very bored was definitely displeasing. Therefore, he was irritated—but not irritated enough to be conscious of his own irritation.

It wasn't a good disposition, being amused and irritated at once, and aware of neither.

The only feeling of which L felt was the itch to know exactly what the girl was doing to her phone. And who she was, why she was here, how she got here, when she had gotten here and—

He stirred another sugar cube into his coffee and watched with morbid fascination as it melted away into the mud-like substance that was already thick with the corpses of previous sugar cubes. Meanwhile, his mind occupied itself with the possible interpretations of the other black-haired creature's actions.

Perhaps she had been kidnapped, and was engaging in an action that was only slightly suspicious in order to rouse the actions of others.

But her phone was functioning. That meant that she wasn't kidnapped.

Perhaps she was only entertaining herself in a bizarre fashion. She was sitting alone, and it was a very typical day during which girls her age and type would probably go out watching movies with friends and self-amuse.

But no one would possibly find half an hour of random-button-pressing amusing. That meant that L had another wrong hypothesis.

Perhaps she was browsing the internet, messaging someone…anything.

No, the latest versions of internet-receptive phones were still under testing. Even L had to rummage quite a while for one—and things L had to search for should be completely inaccessible to the public, and impossible to even dream of for a homeless woman.

_"What could she be doing?"_

L sipped his coffee patiently, staring at the reflection of her image through the dark, luminous surface of his computer screen. She was still at her game. She had started tapping her foot against the ground, obviously impatient. Her fingers drummed against the keypad with increasing speed.

A smile snuck up on the corners of her lips.

_"What does that smile signify? Something must have been achieved. She was scheming, after all."_

L could hear her now. The rapid crashing of her nails against the surfaces of her phone sent rows of muted chatter across the café. Even the self-adsorbed barista leaned over the counter to survey the newest attraction.

L turned around to glance at her, so not as to seem inconspicuous by not glancing at her. But when he turned back around, something was different.

His computer had magically woken up from hibernation, without a single touch. The shining blue picked at his patience.

_"Computers don't do things on their own. Do they? Should they? No, I programmed this myself. Someone must be interfering. Fifty-percent."_

Still, the girl was more distracting than the unreasonable behavior by his lap top. He could go home and fix the machine up (a euphemism for destroy-without-hesitation), but it was unlikely he could meet the homeless woman again.

However, it seemed time had betrayed him. Before he had a chance to return to his analysis, the girl shut her phone with a pleased smirk and waved over the nearest the waiter: "Sir, the bill, please."

L could no longer see her reflection. His computer screen, now shining blue, was too bright to serve as a mirror. But L couldn't turn it back off. It would be suspicious. She probably already noticed him, anyway, with his strange hunchback and bed-hair.

He noted her heavy Chinese accent, obviously that of one who was not a native speaker of the "Queen's English".

_"Chinese accent: what can it mean? Immigrant, perhaps alien resident, moved here at a later age—but does that mean anything? Think. I am being paranoid. That's obvious. No, I am in no state to evaluate my mental stability." _

A few brief and unremarkable words later, at the sound of her chair shuffling against the floor, L darted out of his seat as normally as possible under the pretense of a rush for the toilet.

He had to observe her just one more time. Perhaps there would be a clue. But the environment hadn't changed. The same people. The same scenery.

He caught her thumb pressing abnormally hard against a button on the side of her phone and stared.

What was she doing? Was it on purpose?

After she sauntered out the door L decided it would be left to fate whether he was to meet her again—which was remarkably unlike him. He also had to admit that it was remarkably unlike him to stalk young homeless girls in cafes in the first place.

_"Maybe this was a coincidence. I have been off guard for too long and cannot differentiate fact from hypothesis. There was only a one-percent chance that she wasn't just—no, even one percent needs to be investigated thoroughly."_

L found his way back to his seat swiftly, barely allowing the cold floor to touch his feet, but began slowing the moment his eyes caught onto his laptop.

It had turned itself off—No, it hadn't. It was…

L's lips slid apart slowly, revealing the smallest of cracks. Slowly, he fed his thumb into that crack as he stared at the unexpected surprise that had somehow managed to pop up on his computer screen:

"_Dear Master,_

_I am deliriously sexy and would like to be used for my sexiness. This means, Master I'm-a-cheap-replicate-of-some-unknown-creature-from-The-Grudge, that I would rather not be left unused on a table because—_

_I don't know about you, but for me, hibernating is not sexy._

_At least rub something on me. Even your hands. _

_Yes, rape me with your majestic hands. _

_Sincerely horny,_

_Your Sexy Lappy_

_P.S.: The girl that you were using me to stalk thinks that, for the love of god, you need a comb. And stalking isn't creepy. It's inviting. _

_Post-P.S.: My firewall is so fucked you might as well stick a 'HACK ME' sticker on my cover. Just in case you weren't aware._

_Post-Post-P.S.: I'm sorry if you programmed my firewall yourself and consequently are enraged by the previous statement… you _are_ enraged now, aren't you?_"

By the time L turned around to look out the glass doors again, the fading hum of a motorcycle engine told him the girl was already too far away to be caught.

"Hm." L sat back down into his seat, folding his knees against his chest as he watched Watari's foot travel to the seat opposite of him.

"I apologize for being late." Watari noted, sitting down across the table, "I had just finished preparing the new case."

L stared on blankly, scarcely listening, and Watari continued, "Someone has been hacking into the Pentagon and leaving intentionally humiliating messages …"

L stopped listening entirely and smiled.

He definitely did not have the _faintest_ idea whoever that hacker could be.

**

* * *

**

She was irritating.

She really _was_ irritating.

No, scratch that, she was so incredibly irritating that irritating, at the moment, was really, really just an understate—

"Leila please, _SHHHH_!" The words that flew out of Xiaoxiao's mouth, which was stretched open and practically bleeding vexation onto the dirty carpet below, drew only a fleeing moment of silence.

Leila turned around, eyes half ajar critically, and faced Xiaoxiao with _the_ skin-crawling-hair-standing-panty-pissing _look_.

"You _shushed_ me, Xiao." Leila declared, _the_ look now burning into her face like some kind of bad tar print which would've had seventeenth century witch-hunters giggling in worship.

Xiao felt a shiver of panic dart down her spine and quickly shut her laptop for pre-emptive measures. Not that Leila would dash a vase at it again. Hopefully.

"Did you just shush _me_, Xiao?" At this point Xiao knew that the hurricane was definitely coming: the twisted eyebrows, the unflattering snarl, the narrowed eyes. Xiao braced herself by stuffing her mouth full of hapless jellybeans that had been waiting digestion on the dining table since, probably, years ago. Stuffing her face meant an excuse not to respond to all the rhetorical questions Leila was so found of. Not responding to all the rhetorical questions meant a shorter hurricane. A shorter hurricane meant possibly protecting her tech-babies from Goddess Leila's various mood tantrums during yet another of their one-sided arguments.

Leila Anges Bell took one breath.

And it began: "Oh, m'ai g_aw_d, Xi-a-o. Do you have _any_ idea how noisy _you_ are? Look at you. You look like a street-artist-wannabe. Toss that—you don't even _look_ like one. You _smell_ like one. When was the last time you used deodorant, sweet? Actually, when was the last time you even saw a shower head—no, _water_ tap in general, huh? God, I swear, if..."

The artificial blonde, Leila, raged on and off about all of the despicable hygiene problems her friend sported in a continuous manner. It was so continuous, in fact, that Xiaoxiao began wondering how Leila was _not_ dying from suffocation.

And the two stayed in such a manner, more or less: one rambling, one staring with passive confusion until, eventually, Leila finally dropped her nail filer and stared flatly at the Chinese girl on the couch: "Xiao, why are you living with me again?"

"Because I did your homework for you since grade three." Xiao slapped herself on the hand and regretted swallowing those jelly beans.

Not as if it mattered, of course. Leila didn't even wait to process Xiao's rebuttal before she began yet another tirade, "When are you going to start looking for a job? You even got fired from McDonalds! Mc_Don_alds, for crying out loud!"

Leila paused for the long-awaited gasp for air, and then pointed an accusatory finger at Xiao's laptop, "It's only because you are such a geek, you geek face! When was the last time you talked to someone but me and that stupid lap top? Huh? _Huh_?"

"I got fired from McDonalds because they thought I was hacking into their employee management files." Xiao answered meekly, withdrawing to the end of the couch slowly, "Although, really... I swear I wasn't... I mean, I haven't dropped _that_ low. I was only trying to send the manager a secret message telling him to give me a raise, that was—"

"I don't want to hear your excuses! You're going to find a job. You're going to find one _now_. I don't care what it takes. You will be employed. You _will_." Leila snapped, picking up her nail-filer and police uniform again, and marched promptly out of the room with her blonde hair bouncing and all.

Xiao heaved a sigh of relief—for once, Lei spared her laptop physical mutilation.

The door swung open again before Xiao had even had enough time to get her hands around the laptop, however. The Chinese woman quickly ducked for cover.

Lei's high-pitched screech resonated through the dining room: "When I said you were going to get employed, you idiot, I meant you were going to have to _search_ for a job. Now go fetch the classified section. The newspaper's on the doorstep!"

"Okay, okay, I know, I-"

"_GET IT_."

"Yes ma'am." Xiao scrambled off the couch and ran for the door.

* * *

It was nine o'clock. It was time for the daily hacking. It was definitely time for the daily hacking. The fat men scrambling around the Pentagon must be missing their daily intruder. The looks on their faces must be so disappointed, so sad, so...

Xiao stared at her keyboard, fingers aching to caress those steel-cold, dead-gorgeous silvery, plastic sex gods (otherwise known as keys to the unwise population), and sighed dramatically as she dragged her gaze back to the classified section.

Job search. What the hell?

There were at least forty job openings in each classified section. At least four different types of newspapers. At least two months' editions she would have to plow through. Xiao shuttered. She was going to be calling for interviews for the rest of her life.

Not that the calls were of any good:

_"So, Miss Liang, are you familiar with computers?"_

_"Are you kidding? I hack-I mean, I harbor such an adoration for programming, and… typing. Oh, yes, typing… I type superfast, I promise. Eurm..."_

_"Grrrreaaaat... What about this? We can have you come in for an interview, small one, real informal. Just let me know when works the best for you."_

_"Around midnight, I guess. I do kind of live on a strange...yeah."_

_"Oh, well...o... Okay, see, well, actually, the position was filled up already. I'm sorry. Thanks though. We'll let you know if there are any other availabilities in the future. Buh-bai!"_

Xiao sighed and, swearing quietly, turned her attention back to her laptop.

She was really late today. The guys at the Pentagon must be gasping in anxiety. She couldn't help it. She knew Lei was only helping her but, but, but—

Then the idea struck, kind of like a cosmic explosion of wonderful stardust. Xiaoxiao's eyes were glimmering in hope as she squealed and began pounding on the keyboard. She was going to write the perfect resume, and everyone who owned a computer on planet earth was going to read it.

Literally.

* * *

"What..."

It was the hollow screech, awaiting arrival of the storm. Near breathed slowly. What could it possibly be? Some new-comer stole his chocolate bar again? Some hapless guest mistook him for a little girl again? Hones—

"...the _fuck_, mate?" Mello's voice dashed all the way down the corridor and nearly body-slammed Near off his bean bag. Mello wasn't even in the same room. Near sighed, "Yes, Mello?"

Toleration. Patience. Yes, Patience was a Virtue. Virtue. _Virtue. _He had to put himself in Mello's shoes. Of course, it must be the most sinful, unthinkable act in thousands of years of human history to steal a chocolate bar. Of course, it is the most rude and grotesque thing to mistake a blonde drag-queen for a girl. Of course. Poor Mello. Poor, poor—

"Some idiot sent a copy of her resume to me! How the hell do you typo an e-mail address so badly that it actually matches mine?"

"Mello, you make no sense." Near didn't even bother looking up. He hated days like these. Why did Matt have to have his physical examination on the same day that Mello gets a wrong-address email? What was the probability of that? (0.04%)

"BB says he got a copy too!"

Near didn't respond. He stared at the enormous castle that he had built around himself and picked up another piece.

"So did that fat-ass newcomer, and the anti-social girl, and the…"

Near flinched, scooting instinctively to the side of his plastic castle wall for protection. Just in case.

"Oh, my fucking _god_, Ne—!"

The door slammed open and this time, Near actually did roll off his bean bag. "NEAR, THERE IS A CONSPIRACY."

Near grimaced, peering at Mello with a sad, despondent countenance. Toleration.

* * *

L took the resume in a slightly more collected manner than his successors two floors below. After soothing his first reaction to throw away his laptop, L took a more careful analysis of the files.

The second her picture caught his eyes, a beam completely devoid of good intentions popped up on L's face.

Xiaoxiao Liang, 1732 Summer Drive, Apt. 15, London—was it?


	2. Chapter 2: Game Start

**Chapter Two: Game Start**

The first thing the creature which was at once disorientingly ugly and cute (rare combination) said was: "I know who you are."

"No shit, you know where I live too." Xiao stared flatly at the thing perched on the couch before her, wondering what he meant really.

He seemed not to notice her searing gaze and merely continued dumping packets of sugar into its coffee cup, grazing her back with his pair of dead-owl eyes while at it. She remembered him clearly from before—the question was, really, how the _hell_ could she forget? Not everyone found it fashionable to shuffle around sockless with the eye-circles of evil.

"But habitats are temporary, while identity is unchangeable. I find the latter more threatening in our situation." He crouched a bit lower to his knees, stopping to lift his eyes, while Xiaoxiao Liang pondered if it was possible that he was superhuman.

_Ah, right, that must be his signal to change the conversation topic_, Xiao decided. As she predicted, he moved to the point: "I received the e-mail you sent."

"Oh, the resume?" A smug smile immediately smeared over her face, "How is it? Does it make your penis throb or what?"

"I am sorry to inform you that I do not find getting fired from McDonalds within a month very impressive." He returned, speaking more to his coffee than to Xiao, "However, I find the reason to the event very notable. McDonalds is a prominent corporation with many possible loopholes for free cash within its networks."

"So you knew about my letter to-"

"You would have received much more by silently withdrawing cash from the on-line bank accounts, unnoticed, than sending letters demanding a raise to your manager-who I presume to not be able to tell between Linex and C-for a raise. Therefore, your motive was not the monetary rewards. It was fame, or even worse, simple amusement."

"I guess I have no humorous and yet perkily perverted tale to share, then." Xiao sat back, "So your point of coming here is...?"

"We _do _have a job offer to make." The old man spoke up for the first time and sent Xiao tumbling out of her seat in surprise. She hadn't even noticed him come in.

"Your techniques at tunneling in between technological bureaucracy are somewhat astounding and to call you a hacker should be somewhat of an insult, so we must refrain from addressing your position as such." He mumbled, smiling, "We run a computer-virus company. I observed that you have worked with one of our kinds before, on your resume, and listed the position obscurely as a computer technician."

"I'm not sure what you're talking about, unless you figured out that computer technician is actually a euphemism for under-the-table-dick-sucker." Xiao smiled innocuously, finding interest again in the pair before her. She knew they were lying, but it was rather entertaining thinking about they knew if she knew, or if they knew that she was trying to find if they knew that she knew.

But then that thought, which had been wandering around the back of her head since when she first saw owl-head's face, popped up again. A computer-virus company, sure, but with such a crappy fire-wall on one of its representative's computers? Were they a group of con-artists?

Then again, it might have just been a bait to recruit itchy-fingered, unemployed kids like her...

She was a bit confused as owl-eyes ranted on, "My name is Ryuuzaki. The man behind me is Watari. We are representatives of Gummy&Bear, a firm dedicated to revolutionizing the Trojan. I noticed your ability that day in the cafe, when you hacked onto my laptop."

"An idiot with Computer Programming 101 would have been able to do what I did. Plus you did need a comb, but I didn't want to be too rude about it."

"My laptop is used as bait for people like you, who we are terribly interested in recruiting."

Xiao decided that she might have been too suspicious after all.

"…If you do not believe me, you must have noticed that the hard drive was completely empty. If it wasn't bait, I would have put-as would have ninety-seven percent of our unsuspecting costumers-substantial information within the laptop."

Xiao's brain did a back flip and joined her heart in diving for her stomach.

DING.

Xiao suddenly realized what a mess she was in. Those two weren't a pair of bored freaks out to find friends, or representatives of a creepy, non-existent company, or a pair of tricky con-artists…

They were _detectives_. Creepy, but bad enough to be a threat worth bashing the esc-key for.

If she didn't remember that one trick she picked up from an unassuming and dead FBI agent's abandoned computer, she would have been trapped by these two.

The FBI laptop had an algorithm to hide files in such a way that it seemed empty. To access the files it took was a simple counter-algorithm to unlock the algorithm, which was masquerading as a subfile to run Internet Explorer.

That day she had noticed a facsimile copy of the dead FBI agent's program in his lap-top, but had not thought too much of it. It was exclusive, after all, to FBI and its associates... she had thought that she was just a bit dizzy from typing the mini-keypad her cell-phone mustered, and was seeing things.

But now, in hind-sight, it was obviously the "subfile"—in other words, this creep had the real FBI algorithm.

To confirm her thoughts, she remembered the rather annoying half-bitten apple that shone with particular brilliance that day on the cover of his laptop. She hated Macs. He was using a Mac. Macs use Safari, or Fire-fox, but seldom have a direct access for the original "internet explorer". Which was consistent, because there was no shortcut for internet explorer on his computer.

But things all went awry on the note that, despite all that, he owned a subfile to run a program that didn't exist, which the Mac maker would have never installed. That meant that the file wasn't really for Internet Explorer. He must have had added the file later. He must have put it there for a reason.

And that was when Xiao felt as if she was about to piss her pants in half fright, half amusement.

Some hair-fashionata would definitely not be able to get his hands on an FBI file in hell-unless he was much more than an obvious freak. He was associated with the FBI, so thoroughly that they would actually let him own a copy of their private property.

He was a detective. If not the FBI's, then better than the FBI's. Either way, he was out to get her—and undercover, because he was smart enough to realize that she would be smart enough to read his steps... only after they had already been taken.

It all made sense now, but much too slowly. She knew that he had noticed her silence long ago.

Everything began unwinding, rolling much too quickly in her brain. All the multiple imaginary voices she was so found of debating with came on in one loud, cacophonous mess.

_Oh, snap. If he was telling you that there were no other files on his computer, he must have been probing for your reaction, you dumbass!_

_Damned right, probing to see if you'd have one, because if you did, then he would know that you know that there was FBI's shit on his bloody fucking Mackie-Mac. _

_Ne-uuuu, XIAO, we're going to prison! We're all going to prison! Ne-ee-uuuu! Let's go back to McDonalds and flip burgers, okay? Okay?_

_And he would realize that the only way she would freak out at that program was if she knew that it was something that most people, including herself, shouldn't know about..._

_Xiao, we're really getting screwed this time, aren't we? Ha-ha!_

It was to her harm that her actual silence was probably exactly the reaction he had expected.

"Um..." She said slowly, clearing all the voices out of her head to stare at the real person before her. What the hell, if he was playing games with her, she was going to lob back with all her strength, "Actually, why do you have an FBI file on your computer? Furthermore, why are you lying about not having it?"

The owl-thing peered at her, and a subtle smile crept onto his face, "That was the real interview: only the fit can recognize that the subfile exists. You were right, idiots with introductory computing could have been able to hack into my computer. Half of the essential components of a superb fire-wall were gone, but the key was discovering an out-of-place subfile for a non-existent program in the haystack. We understand that you are unemployed, and have been for a few months. This apartment is leased under your friend's name, so you must be in need of money. If you join Bear&Gummy, we will give you an advance of five thousand dollars, upon signing the contract."

It was obvious that he had simply skipped over the FBI part as if she had never said it, but Xiao had other things to worry about.

She had noticed that he switched the words-Gummy&Bear first, then Bear&Gummy. He must be deliberately tricking her now, seeing if she noticed. If she did, it must have meant that she was more nervous and suspicious of her explanation than she showed.

Consequently, she pretended that she hadn't noticed it at all, "Right, got a copy? And what would be my title, exactly?"

"Chief of staff."

There was no way in hell she could avoid not noticing that one: "I beg your sweet, eternal pardon?"

"Well, you see, the company right now is-" He tried to make a face, but it failed so miserably that Xiao was ready to laugh, "Is just the two of us. With some volunteers. It must be due to the economic downfall; many employees are becoming laid off, so..."

"Here is a copy of our contract. If we get more employees after this, we will promote you to become a partner." The old man pushed forward a thick stack of paper, full of small font.

For a moment Xiao believed that she was just being paranoid. They might not have been detectives. They must have been superior programmers who actually managed to hack into the FBI and steal their golden trick.

But, to confirm, she asked without much interest, "What is our first project, out of interest?"

"We're going to design a file to hack into the Pentagon." The owl-creature smiled slowly at the stunned look on Xiao's face.

She had been caught. All they needed were handcuffs. Oh, god, they knew it all. Her nightly messages to the fat old farts who were dotting around the dungeon and freaking out that they were getting commented about their teeny brains and humongous waist-sizes.

She hadn't thought it would be this way, that the Pentagon would actually bother to deal with her in terms of people, not in terms of a glorious computer-programming, low and dirty duel in Java-language. Now she had to run, not from being discovered, but from being stuffed into a jail cell.

"Oh, the Pentagon?" She gasped with good-natured surprise, "Why on earth would you want to do that? Isn't that-err-dangerous? I mean, wouldn't we go to, like, jail for it?"

"An anonymous company offered the commission on condition that it is to be delivered, the virus and the antidote, by the end of the month. However, you may be relieved to find that you will not be handling the case on your own; I will help." Ryuuzaki looked almost happy, "And yes, we will go to prison, under article one-seven-seven of the EU bylaws, for a life-sentence if we are caught."

Xiao fell silent. He was just playing her now, trying to make her run or pull something suicidal. Instead, she breathed slowly, "I'm in need of money, that's true... so what will you help me with?"

"Finding a way to hack into the Pentagon, of course. I also graduated from MIT, you see, just two years after you did." Ryuuzaki stated simply. She could see his heart giggling in glee, while her inside lurched upside down and moaned in desperation. MIT, yeah, right. What about School for Lying Detectives? Fuck the guy. Double, triple fuck the fucking fuck-tard.

Xiao had never been a "good" child by any standard. She had always taken it to be her natural-born destiny to torture the living shit out of adults, governments, and anything that desired to put a hold on her. The only reason she kept at it was because she was never caught-was always close to, because she had let them be close. But now it was a different story.

Xiaoxiao was twenty years old, and it was the first time she had been owned like a rightful pup.

But then, for a split second, it came to her.

For all this while, nothing had been said. Not even a hint had been given as to what they really were.

Maybe she was just being paranoid, like a post-menstrual bag of wrinkles with a bitterly untouched va-jay-jay.

In which case...

She gazed at the old man, and at the unsmiling face before her. Adrenaline sped down her body, leaving her to twitch in happiness. She still had time. They had no evidence, no grab on her of anything. Sure, they were detectives and they knew it was her-or suspected it was her-but they've got no hold on her. She was still free like the wind. She could beat them still, and that would be the best thing that would have ever, _ever_ happened to her.

"Okay." She scribbled some illegible thing on the signature line and handed the file back without reading the small-font.

"Five-thousand in cash, as promised." Owl-face handed her a wade of bills and she accepted ungraciously, pocketing it in her hoodie, "Thanks."

He looked disappointed, for some reason. Perhaps that she didn't count it. But it was too late to take it back out and count.

"I'll walk you to the door." She mumbled, standing up quickly. The two were gone in less than a minute.

When the door was closed and she watched their car back out of the parking lot, she took out a silver-detector, some crappy old thing that Leila used to believe in, and went lurking around the apartment. Particularly around where Ryuuzaki crouched, and where the old geezer stood.

When the broken old thing went beeping like a crazy-maniac on steroids, the first thing that came to Xiao's mind was "Welcome to the twenty-first century. The new thing to put in hidden cameras is copper... how do they plan to catch me with century-old, first-James-Bond-edition cameras?"

The fact that this was solid evidence that she was a suspect-a very much suspected one at that-only came as an afterthought.

But then it made no sense. Detectives sensible enough to figure out, somehow, that she was the culprit behind the Pentagon-hackings must have had better technology. And even if they didn't, they would be smart enough to not leave the obvious behind.

Why did they use this type on purpose? Did they wish to be found?

After dislodging the camera, she took out the paper bills and flipped through them. Nothing spectacular. It was all real print, except...

She noticed the message on the rubber band that held it together and grinned like a maniac.

_"Justice to Hacks. Game one-love. Team Gummy&Bear wins. Watch next move." _

She sat down, toying slowly with the rubber-band before pulling a phone-book from underneath the kitchen sink. At first she flipped it open to the TOUR ASIAN AT LOW PRICES! pages, but changed her mind and began flipping towards the front of the tome.

* * *

L couldn't help but smile when he noticed the camera view shift once on his laptop screen and stop. Watari had put the camera beneath a table corner, and tables simply don't shift and stop in such a way.

He put it there specifically so that any movement from the lens must be on purpose. Therefore, she must have seen his camera, but knew that if she unplugged it, then she was admitting that-

Yet, suddenly, the screen went blank. She _did_ unplug it. Was she bragging about knowing that he knew that she was Pentagon Hacker?

Such subtlety, L commented with little wit.

L's face dropped for a split second—finally realizing the purpose of her clumsily obvious maneuver—before he fed the tip of a thumb into his mouth, "Watari, are we on good terms with the London police?"

"Why, L?" The old man looked through the mirror and didn't wait for an answer when his phone rang.

L listened despondently. It didn't feel much different to him than listening to a battle ultimatum from a competitor who knew she was going to win and wasn't going to be merciful about it.

Except, of course, L knew that _he_ was going to win it.

"Hello, Watari speaking... Yes Officer Harris... Yes, we will be there in a minute... Yes, we know she found the camera...Yes, we realize this could be violation of the law and her privacy and will uncover us, but it was an accident... Yes, we will be there right away… No, we did not intend for her to find the camera…Yes, alright, we will be there in a moment."

Watari declared as he threw the phone down, "She found the camera and submitted us-"

L knew already. "She is on offense."

Silence diffused throughout the car for a few seconds.

And then Watari jumped.

It was the first time in a while that he had heard a chuckle from L. It was slightly disorienting, but equally disturbing. It wasn't difficult to tell that L wanted to catch Xiaoxiao Liang just as much as he wanted to dangle her around and play with her.


	3. Chapter 3: The Ambassador's Jailbreak

**Chapter Three: The Ambassador's Jailbreak**

* * *

The New Scotland Yard opened its Tuesday interrogation hours to the worst possible combination of suspect, victim, bystander, and investigator.

Liang Xiaoxiao looked as if nothing better had ever happened to her, while L kept scratching one foot with another. One looked as if she had won the lottery, while the other as if he was dawdling in a horridly witless situation. Standing between the two, Watari looked complacent with the brewing catastrophe. How on earth the old man managed such a feat put the police officer, the fourth person in the room, in awe. How the room hadn't become a reenactment of WWII was rather incredible... or frightening.

_'Probably both.'_ the officer decided without much forethought.

"Thanks for coming." Xiaoxiao smiled happily towards L, who acknowledged her with a rather stoic and questionable nod. Rather, it seemed more as if the detective was waiting for something else to happen. Watari stood aside, listening as the officer made a hasty attempt at explaining the situation:

"It happens that Ms. Liang has discovered these devices in her home after your departure, Decte—_Mister_ Ryuuzaki."

"Since I have not received any guests in my apartment before, these must naturally belong to you. Well, they may also belong to the prior inhabitants, who were actually chased out due to unpaid rent—and therefore could not have possibly left something so valuable." Xiaoxiao twirled a small, sparkling cube in her hand, "I think this is actually one of the original sets of hidden recording devices, no? Marketed by Kuniss and Company in 1923. Market cost should be around a couple hundred grand US."

"Um…" The officer frowned, blinking rapidly to fill in the silence from L's unopened mouth.

He had been told by the department chief to look out for L, though he wasn't sure exactly how he was meant to do so if both the detective and the "culprit" (who was actually playing prosecutor at the moment) seemed either more intelligent or insane than he was. Not as if it made a difference. Either way, he couldn't understand what they were insinuating... or if they were insinuating at all.

After he had gotten the stray gaze of the Asian girl, he suddenly couldn't stop clearing his throat. There was something about the way the woman looked at people: somewhat intimidating, somewhat terrorizing, and mostly disorienting. It was as if she could see through pasts with just a casual glance.

_'No wonder Detective L couldn't open his mouth.'_ The officer decided that nothing was better than flattery, "Excellent, Ms. Liang! You must be well educated."

In response, Xiao lifted an unimpressed eyebrow. And that was all.

"I admit to having left these devices in her apartment on purpose." L responded to no one in particular, though his gaze was digging firmly into Xiaoxiao's eyes, "However, Miss Xiaoxiao Liang, since you don't seem to be the _lawful _lessee of your apartment, it might present a problem if brought to court…"

L continued with a small smile. The victory was obvious, "Since you would first have to clear a lawsuit to explain the reason as to your residing unlawfully in another's residence, you may be in jail before we have a chance to settle this offense. But on that topic, have you informed the actual lessee of our misconduct yet,_ offender_?"

Suddenly all the imaginary flowers booming off Xiaoxiao's face disappeared. She stared at L with an ill-meant vengeance, which had even the officer cringing in discomfort, "Why, thank you for the notice, _offender_."

"Yes, thank you for your notice, offender." The officer chirped along, trying to look natural in the tense atmosphere, before he recognized what slipped out of his—and more importantly, Xiao's—mouth, "Uh, I mean, uh, Mister Ryuu—"

"Since there seems to be no problem after all, we will be returning to our business. Ms. Liang, we look forward to seeing you tomorrow." L turned sharply to his left and began walking towards the corridor.

Xiao watched as the two exited, and then hurried after without another look at the officer, who was waving her paperwork in hesitation.

"Uh, Miss Liang, what would you like to do with your case—" The officer called after the three absent-mindedly, still recovering from the deathly atmosphere, "Would you like to drop it?"

"If you let Leila know of any of this, I will advertise your pornographic habits so widely that you'd want to chop off your own scrotum and wear a bra."

* * *

"He knew it was going to turn out like this from the beginning." Xiao crossed her arms, seething at her own feet as, meters away, L crawled into his limousine, "What was his point? Testing how terrified I am of Leila? It's not as if she would let _him _exploit her, anyway."

Xiaoxiao snarled as the car began backing out of the parking space and, surprisingly enough, headed towards her.

"It is not to my worry whether or not I receive permission for exploitation." L beamed without a hint of hesitation as he leaned out of the opened car window, "It would not qualify as exploitation otherwise, would it, Miss Liang?"

Xiaoxiao "You attempt to make a fool of me, L?"

"Because I have already gotten what I wanted, it is out of courtesy that I satisfy your curiosity to the best of my abilities." L retreated back into his seat and began scrolling the window upwards. Xiao didn't need to hear him to watch what came out of his lips next: "_And I don't need permission to make a fool out of you_."

"Aren't you a generous one?" Xiao yanked off her slipper and pitched it after L's windshield. Not much to her surprise, the car turned immediately, and just enough to avoid her shoe by a hair's width.

He really _was_ toying with her.

Xiao cackled dryly as she hopped towards her shoe, sputtering obscenities before snapping up to take one last look at L's black Rolls Royce: "How _dare_ he."

* * *

The entire trans-Atlantic London-New York flight had their attention stolen by a blob of dark-haired, horridly dressed, and homeless-looking Chinese amoeba two minutes into boarding. It just so happened that the woman also looked dangerously irritated as she kicked her carry-on luggage violently under the seat before her: "I can't differentiate plane-ticket sellers from sexually deprived robbers. Five grand for a solo! I barely had enough change to pay the taxi…"

It had only been seventy-eight hours since she decided to take the world's best detective on, and the Chinese hacker was already beginning to regret it-at least the running abroad part.

"It appears that you bought your ticket at the last possible moment."

Her regrets were only confirmed by her predator's unmistakably monotonous drawl. Xiao took her time looking up from her luggage. She didn't want to look as shocked as she actually was (though how the hell did L find out that she was on this flight when she purchased the tickets under a pseudonym and a traceless wireless connection really was beyond her).

"Oh, _Ryuuzaki._" Xiao grinned cheekily when her eyes met the ghostly, dull ones which were widened, as usual, to unnatural sizes, "I didn't expect you to miss me already."

_'So much for disappearing without a trace,'_ Xiao decided, _'if he was tailing after me and flaunting it too.'_

Then again, if he had managed to hunt her down just from a meeting in a cafe, expecting anything less would be insulting. The detective seemed to think the same and allowed her to witness the horridly disorienting and adorable smile which crawled up on his lips, "It's a coincidence, as usual." He mumbled, "Fortunately, I ordered my tickets two weeks ahead of time and only needed one thousand for each, round-trip."

Judging by the victorious smile, he was probably telling the truth-which meant he had planned her moves and exactly what was going to happen before he even met her...

_"Creee~peeee."_ A voice sing-songed inside of her, to which Xiao responded, _"Not heeeel~piinnng~"_ before deciding that talking to herself probably wasn't a healthy way deal with the world's best detective.

"Why, thank you for the snide comment." Xiao sighed, turning towards the window. Even if he was trying to catch her, Xiao decided, he could be slightly gentler in lecturing her about procrastination.

"Since we are going to be colleagues, there's no harm in helping one another improve, is there?" L pasted an unnatural—and so, _so_ obviously—fake (more importantly, nauseatingly gay) looking smile over his cheeks. Immediately Xiao wanted to burst out laughing, but only restrained it into a humongous grin.

"Then I will have the second comment. Your smile, Ryuuzaki, looks as if you're gazing into the depths of a strawberry-and-whipped-cream-and-vanilla-ice-cream-with-chocolate-chips-and-melting-fudge-and-caramel-topping-filled _vagina_."

L's face flashed dark for a moment before he returned, expressionlessly, "Perhaps Xiao has considered being slightly less aggravating with her remarks."

"And perhaps Ryuuzaki must have considered lying less." Xiao bounced back, not even glancing at the man next to her.

She was still getting over the fact that he now considered himself close enough to her to actually mock the way she spoke, despite threatening her with Leila only hours earlier.

On the other hand, it proved him as a certainly formidable opponent. She had expected him to reveal his identity as a detective in the police station, but he had cleverly dodged it by hiding behind her weakness. A ting of respect bubbled within Xiao.

"And perhaps Xiao has considered—" L was interrupted by an eruption of tears and snot and childish absurdity next to him, _"WAAAAH! MOMMIE, THERE IS A MONSTER NEXT TO ME!" _

And the little ting of respect disappeared immediately.

"And perhaps Ryuuzaki must have considered looking slightly more alive." Xiao chuckled bitterly, flaunting her crooked grin in an attempt to catch him disappointed. In the background, the mother-child pair didn't appear to have any intention to shut up: "_Sweetie, it's alright, don't cry, it's rude!" _

L scoffed, slightly insulted, "And perhaps Xiao has considered judging a person less by their countenance, or at least herself, for surely it must be a blow to self-confidence."

"_WAAAH! MONSTER! MONSTER!"_

"And perhaps Ryuuzaki must have considered being a little less mean towards children."

"And perhaps Xiao has considered putting an end to demeaning assumptions. Only fools underestimate others."

"_WAAH—oh." _

Xiao couldn't help looking over to witness the sudden stop in the raging cries. The sobbing boy had an incredulous look on his face as L handed him a bag of marshmallows, whipped out from nowhere. Quickly the boy did not glance again in L's direction and wiped all tears away on the apologetic mother's t-shirt.

"And perhaps Ryuuzaki must have considered changing the way he is, instead of the way he is perceived, in order to stop threatening those who perceive him."

Watari watched from the aisle behind the two and contemplated why felt the younger man appeared to be, heaven forbid, _enjoying_ the dialogue with America's Most Wanted?

* * *

"Where will you be staying, Miss Liang?" Watari arched an eyebrow as the three walked out of the airport. L had instructed him to buy her into keeping close by any means, but Xiaoxiao Liang didn't look even slightly fased, "In a hotel, of course."

"However, it seems as if you are broke." L remarked, still intent on verbally abusing the hacker.

"You aren't too dull, after all, Ryuuzaki." Xiaoxiao smirked, "But then again, neither am I."

Watari watched, with a bad feeling in his gut, as the girl left the trio to jog up to an old lady. Without hesitation she yanked the tattered bag off the aging woman.

The old lady didn't quite react (probably still surprised that a grinning young girl was so happily yanking her obviously penniless sac from her hands... and was in fact shouting for help). Meanwhile, Watari amused himself with the reason why Xiao was calling for help after having robbed a poor woman. Judging by L's flattened gaze, it was apparent that the detective had already seen through the act.

"Ah, security, security please!" Xiaoxiao cried, cupping a hand gingerly around her mouth as men in blue uniforms ran up, "May we assist you, miss?"

"Oh, yes, I was assaulting and robbing this old lady right there."

"Is this so, madam?" One of the young officers frowned, obviously baffled. Watari was sympathetic with the young man, though he was still not quite on track with just why Xiao had bothered with the act. Did she actually _want_ to be arrested?

At the sight, the corners of L's lips were beginning to curl up (a rare sight); it was as if the detective was just as amused as his counterpart. Watari estimated L's thoughts behind his mischievous grin and decided genius wasn't the only thing the detective had in common with his prey.

"Is this so, sir?" Another guard turned towards L, but began looking alarmed as soon as his gaze came upon L's face, as if regretting his decision to approach the shorter man, "Did you see an assault and robbery, sir?"

From a meter away Xiaoxiao clasped her hands together and squeezed her eyes shut, mouthing "PLEASE" rather ostensibly.

Watari watched L nod from the corner of his eyes.

"We will need your phone number and an ID for further contact, sir." The officer mumbled, somewhat intimidated by L's simple movement.

Watari stepped in, "Ah, yes, here is my colleague's identification…"

A few moments later the security guards, still looking as baffled as before, decided to wrap the case up, "In which case, Miss, we are placing you under temporary arrest for robbery and assault of—"

"Mrs. Anna Labelle." The old woman croaked, still staring at the smiling young woman in disbelief as Xiao cheerful thrust her purse back into the old lady's hands.

"Mrs. Anna Labelle. The assailant, Miss—"

"Liang Xiaoxiao."

"Miss Liang Xiaoxiao, you have the right to remain silent and to obtain a lawyer. Anything you say may be used against you in a court of law…"

Watari inched closer to L, whispering as he watched the scene unclose, "Why?"

* * *

"Why?" Watari asked again as he accompanied a masked L into one of the Pentagon branches. The black-haired man nodded to in return to numerous salutes from passing figures while constructing a response: "It's a way to avoid us. If she's in jail, we cannot contact her as normal civilians. She's forcing us to give up our real identities and intentions. And, I suppose, going to jail is another method of obtaining free food and residence."

"Why did you affirm the robbery, then?"

"If I hadn't then she would have asked the officer to call upon another witness, who would push me into the position as an 'obstruction to law enforcement' with a truthful testimony. I would also be in jail, though in my current state, they would release me immediately. The release would be as obvious as my own admitting to be a detective."

Watari turned his attention to the oversized pink ball of over-stuffed fat before the two of them, "Good afternoon, General Kim."

"How is the case?" The old man bellowed. L looked almost bored by the display, "We have identified a possible suspect who is twelve-percent likely to be the criminal. But unfortunately, she's in jail."

"What?" Kim hollered, though L was completely unfazed as before, "But she will hack her way out, of course."

"So then you must have planned for this." A smile bloomed quickly over the sack of pink fat, though L was already beginning to be distracted by other thoughts: "No, but things do tend to turn for my advantage."

* * *

"That's a nice-lookin' cell-phone. Gimme here!"

"_No_—" Xiaoxiao groaned and slapped away a hand to resume tapping away on her mobile phone, "Aahhh, so close! Goddammit, this fuck-shit…"

"Whacha doin'?"

"I wanna see! I wanna see!"

"Give us it!"

Another hand, a little tanned in color, grabbled onto Xiao's phone. Suddenly Xiao froze, and the crowd behind her mumbled laughter, "Watcha actin' so serious fo', bitch? It's just a hone, anyway—"

"YOU WANNA DIE?" Xiao swung around, the phone in her hand looking more deadly than a bona fide chainsaw. It seemed as if all the Londoner Chinese inside of her exploded in one raw pulp of Asian-wrath.

Suddenly all the comrade inmates in the cell took a step backwards. Their widened eyes guaranteed silence.

Xiao took another step forwards, and the other women began scrambling—all because of the vicious, inhuman spark that had exploded in Xiao's face the second someone touched her cell-phone.

"If any of you dare to touch my baby again, I will rip out your uterus. If any of you dare to touch _me_ again, I will chop off your ears and feed it to the guard dog, and then I'm going to stew the mother fucking guard dog and you can all enjoy dinner with me. If you think you're stronger then me, I will kill myself and come back as a ghost and drag you down a dark corridor and you'll be clinging so hard onto the walls that your nails will break off and scratch against the wall singing like chalk on the chalk-bard. And then I will kill you, and mutilate you so bad even the Devil would be afraid of your face and no one would want to have to do with your corpse and not a single soul will dare to even cremate you because you would become so ugly."

The Chinese madwoman breathed in slowly and morphed her face into a morbidly friendly smile, "_Perfectly merry_, aren't I? Let's get along."

"Ye—yea…"

"Say yes."

"YES."

"Now, then..." Xiao groaned, returning back to her programming as the women quivered in the other end of the cell, whispering about how psychotic the new girl was and exactly what kind of evil deed she committed to join them.

Her programming was interrupted by a call. For moments Xiao couldn't figure out why the device in her hand was ringing—until she realized the true purpose of a phone.

"Hello?" She mumbled. Ryuuzaki's caller ID had been on, and he was the last person she felt like talking to…

"Hello Xiao, this is Ryuuzaki."

_'Yes, no shit. Why else do you suppose I sound so depressed?'_

"Why, how are you, Ryuuzaki?" Xiao snarled unpleasantly.

"It happens to be you that we are more concerned about—

_('I would believe you more easily if you told me a comet the size of Jupiter had just rammed a hole into earth an inch away from my jailhouse and now aliens were going to invade earth and I was offered by the President of the United States as a human sacrifice')_

—you see, it was said in our contract that a day of missed work meant, after all, that you would pay me five thousand dollars to finish your share of the job."

"Wait, what—" Xiao's eyes widened. Damn it, she should've read the—

"Page thirty-two, line twelve, starting five words from the right."

"You _pimp_."

"Since you were so keen on staying in jail, I just thought I might drop you a reminder—

_('Do you call this a fucking reminder, you bitch owl?')_

—Watari and I have arranged for a hotel room for you, free of charge, as our welcome-gift for you. In fact, it is only five miles directly north of where you are staying."

'Only _five miles? How about offer me your head on a platter instead?'_

"Welcome gift?"

"Ah! Yes, of course, I forgot to remind Xiaoxiao that our company headquarters is actually right here. In fact, it is coincidentally only one floor below the room we have arranged for you—

_('Coincidentally?')_

—Also, Miss Leila Bell seems rather worried about you."

"You dickface, you told LEILA? DO YOU WANNA DIE?" Xiao clasped a hand over her mouth as the women in the jail cell began scampering back to the opposite corner of the cell. Damn it, that was supposed to be a thought.

"_You have an admirable friendship with Miss Bell."_ L sounded more than amused and Xiao wasn't sure if she should be glad.

Her face turned from dark to darker. The women behind her wondered sullenly if they should call for security to protect them, in case their Chinese comrade went insane. Instead, Xiao ended the conversation quickly with—"Well, then I will not waste your generous present. See you tomorrow, Ryuuzaki."

There was a click.

All faces leaned forward with anticipation, waiting for her to explain her mysterious caller—until they were shot down by a hard stare, "And what might you be looking at, ladies?"

Everyone scattered with the glare from Xiao, though keeping an eye on the cell-phone in the woman's hands. Xiao returned to her phone, this time bull-dozing it with even more passion than before, as if she was really trying to weather away all the keys.

A moment later the girl grinned, clicking her phone shut and approaching them with a dangerous and suspiciously happy smile, "Alright! Well, I'm leaving now, friends! It was a nice time that we spent with one another."

She grabbed one girl by the arm and yanked the small thing towards her. Everyone watched breathlessly as the Chinese woman… _hugged_ the girl.

'Jesus. Fucking. Christ.' Was the first mutual thought amongst all the brains in the cell, followed by, 'Is this a cue to call the cops?'

Xiao ended her friendly moment with, once again, the searing gaze and everyone relaxed, "If any of you report that I had a cell-phone on me, or that I was here with you at all, just remember what I would do as a ghost. Think about those broken nails and trails of cracked blood on the walls as I drag you down, deep in to the black, black corridors for eternal pain... Sweet dreams!"

With that, the Chinese girl sauntered towards the door.

"Wait, it won't open! The doors are, what's it called, er, dee-gii-tall-ised, or some'in, so your kung-fu kick ain't gonna work!" A black woman warned to get on the woman's good side, but stopped short when Xiao pushed the door open with two fingers.

"Ah, yes, I'm 'digitalized' as well." The last comment from Xiao fluttered in the air as she waltzed off into the corridors.

"Aren't there guards out there?" Someone remarked. Confused voices agreed.

"Out of my way!" A commanding shout echoed from down the corridor. The entire group rushed towards the door, trying to take a peek. A few meters down, a guard was talking with the Chinese girl hurriedly.

It sounded as if they were bickering, but whatever the case, the Chinese girl absolutely had the upper hand—or louder voice: "I'm the bloody Chinese peace ambassador, you idiot, sent straight from the secretary general himself. You, on the other hand…first you cage me in here with these lunatic prisoners with a joke of an excuse—assault, heaven forbid, and now you even try talking _back _to me? How dare you!"

The women in the cell blinked, staring at one another with arched eyebrows. Chinese ambassador, really? Well, they didn't feel too surprised—though she was a bit macho and horrifying for a _peace_ ambassador…

"_Officer Yeats, it has been confirmed from the computer registry that Liang Xiaoxiao is in fact the Chinese peace ambassador…"_

The walkie-talkie's response left the entire hallway in silence. The prisoners stared at one another in confusion and amazement, assuming the position of an ambassador to be some top-dog thing, like the quarterback or something, in the government.

"Ah, I'm so sorry, Ambassador Liang!" The guard, whose face had looked stone-hard merely a second ago, quickly broke into a long string of nervous laughter, "I'm so sorry! Please overlook this!"

"Overlook? I will certainly report to the home country as well as the US government about your insolence in particular, Mister John Yeats, ID number A-twenty-five… oh, don't move, I have to read it to remember clearly when I tell your—"

"I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry!" The man dropped onto his knees, "Please, can you please, please, I beg of you, Ambassador, I have a wife and four children, can you please pretend as if you were never here? Please!"

"Sure, then, _I_ was _never_ here. Don't forget this, or else I will make your wife and four children sorry, John Yeats, even if I'm not the ambassador."

The women prisoners weren't sure if it was really a smile they saw on the Chinese comrade's face as she hurried away.

They were even less sure of their sanity when, four hours later, a voice from John Yeats' walkie-talkie exploded with—_"All officers! A recent file of a woman of Asian decent, previously held in cell seven-two-four, has mysteriously disappeared from the computer databases! All officers beware, an escapee has hacked into our files! She is of Asian decent, in her early twenties or late teens, height of around five-feet four-inches, eye-color brown, hair-color black…"_

"Whoa, that bitch was the shit." A woman commented, "So she wasn't an, what was it ag'en, ambass, or whatever, was she?"

"Who the hell are you talking about? I don't remember no Chinese woman here." Someone else snapped.

"Yeah, I dun'either… do you, Mister Yeats?"

A pause, and a hardened gaze. "No, course I don't… Now shut up."

* * *

L didn't look at all surprised to have his door flung open at three-thirty in the morning by a girl who seemed, at this point, more like a vengeful ghost than a computer hacker.

"Would you like some coffee?" He offered indifferently, holding up a cup to demonstrate that he didn't have any obscure double meaning. Xiao, however, did not seem at all pleased, "I passed by four hotels on my way here. Why is it that you couldn't arrange for one that was, oh, say, two blocks closer to-"

"Jail? Well, since you didn't exactly serve full-time, I thought perhaps I should do the government a small favor and dawn justice upon its criminals."

"You're calling_ me_ a criminal?"

"_You _assaulted and robbed."

Xiao snarled, having nothing else to say, and kicked the cover off his bed, "I'm sleeping here."

"Not in your room, which is only four meters away?"

"If I can't sleep well, then neither can you."

"You would be glad to find that I don't sleep." L smiled gleefully to his coffee cup, with his back turned towards the girl. Something cheered him up about being with her.


	4. Chapter 4: Sex Ed

**Chapter Four: Sex Ed.**

* * *

Mello, Matt, and Near, who was dozing off to sleep, sat in a small circle around a laptop. It was two in the morning, four hours past their curfew, but they had managed to convince (via threatening and certain fire-cracker related incidents) Roger into allowing their emergency meeting.

Mello rushed Matt every now and then and slapped the albino one over the head occasionally to keep the kid conscious.

The three of them called it Operation Willy Wonka (which was strictly Mello's idea), and that was the only thing about which they had agreed. Everything from there had involved intense debating, firing of guns, and forts of Lego toys. In truth, the mission of the operation wasn't actually defined, as of yet.

But of course, none of them would admit it.

Well, they had generally called together the meeting to "help" L, although each sported different ideas of achieving the end. Mello decided that they were looking for the address, phone number, social security number, and blood type of the wrench who dared to send him a copy of her resume. Matt was convinced the operation was for locating the mysterious jail-breaking ambassador. Near thought it was to aid L in securing the identity of the Pentagon Hacker.

All said and done, Matt was the only one working anyway.

"I found it." The red-head mumbled an hour later, to no one in particular—for even Mello had fallen into a slumber (and leaning on Near, on top of that). He tried again, "Hello? You guys awake?"

"Thank you, Mister Willy Wonka, I will gratefully accept…" Mello mumbled.

"I found a lead." Matt repeated for the last time and twitched in fright when Mello's eyes suddenly snapped open, "Really? You found it?"

Matt chuckled at the disgusted look that covered Mello's face once the blonde realized he had been in contact with his albino comrade.

"It was done with a cell-phone, using an original programming language—which was why we couldn't run the copy on our computer. It seems as if the language was based on an entirely different counting system." Matt rubbed his eyes and replaced his goggles, "The phone is one of the exclusive Samsung products offered only in England. I traced the buyer to Leila Bell, a chief detective at London Police."

"Why would Bell send us her resume if she was already employed? And why from her phone?"

"Resume? Aren't we talking about the ambassador? And wasn't the resume under the name of Liang Xiaoxiao, who sent it ob-vi-ous-ly by computer?" Matt arched an eyebrow, putting down again the playboy which he had just picked up.

Mello's eyes narrowed, "Are you _defying_ me, Matt?"

"We actually convened for this operation in order to aid L in his search for the Pentagon Hacker. It is clear that Liang Xiaoxiao is a completely different matter from Leila Bell, who may or may not be related to the Pentagon Hackings, which means that _both_ of you should go to sleep and put a rest to this absurd operation." Near nodded, eyes still closed. Matt could swear he witnessed steam was gushing out of Mello's ears...

And suddenly the atmosphere in the room dropped. Matt quickly scampered for cover and Mello drew out his BB gun.

* * *

L finished his nap when his computer screen began flashing orange and green. It was an incoming call from the orphanage.

He tried conjuring up the possibilities which would give rise to the occasion: perhaps Mello finally succeeded in burning down the place, perhaps Beyond had scared off all the younger ones, perhaps Near had been tarred black due to sun-exposure, perhaps—

"HELLO?" The speakers erupted and three faces appeared on his screen, before L had a chance to even touch his computer.

Ah, so they were actually _using_ his computer. L wasn't sure if he was to be impressed that the juniors have learned how to bypass his computer firewall and manipulate his software, or angry that they were manipulating it at all.

"Hello." L responded, staring sullenly at the three as he plugged in the headphones, in order not to awake the sleeping Asian in the bed a few meters away.

There was a face stuffed too close to the camera and hence looked enormous on his screen, another with his goggled eyes downcast, and another looking completely disinterested. Mello, Matt, and Near, respectively.

"_L, we have identified the ambassador who broke out from jail last night_." Mello rushed, "_She's not Chinese, actually, she's of complete English decent and a Chief Detective at the London police force—and she hacked out of jail using just a cell-phone!_"

"Mm." L didn't feel surprised. Other than the enormous mistake they made about Bell, everything else was already background knowledge, "Is there anything else?"

"_Well, she seems to be living in London right now, so we called the police and they're arresting her at the moment—_"

L's eyes suddenly popped open, "_Arresting _Leila Agnes Bell?"

"_How did you know her name?_" Mello sparkled with fandom, and L's heart dropped all the way into his stomach. He didn't have the courage to turn his head to the direction of the bed on which Xiaoxiao Liang was snoring away.

"_L is always a step ahead of us_." Near yawned, "_Please take care of yourself, L. We are going to sleep now, so good—_"

"_Wait no! I'm not done speaking to L ye_—_Beep_."

L stared blankly at his computer screen. It was the first time in ages that he felt afraid. In fact, he wasn't just afraid. He was beginning to become paranoid. He wondered if it would be a good idea to pack up and run now, before Xiao finds out what had been done, and then decided it would be useless since Xiao would probably track him down and do something terrible to his sex organs if he ran.

* * *

It was four twenty in the morning.

Leila Bell sat across from her subordinate, who flinched every time she looked up at him. It was no surprise. She looked like a giant, baggy-eyed ball of murderous evil, who was rotten to the point of having given up on hiding her evil intentions.

"There must be a mistake." Her soft protest sounded worse than the thunder.

"Yes, there definitely is." He repeated meekly, blinking rapidly and near tears, "Would you like some coffee? Tea? Watermilkjuice? ...Blood?"

"It's four in the morning. I haven't had my beauty sleep and consequently I look like a runaway panda from the circus." She tapped her foot impatiently on the concrete floor and her subordinate began trembling terribly.

To the observers outside the interrogation window she seemed to be the one interrogating, despite her handcuffs.

"I have a blind date in fourteen hours minus nineteen minutes and thirty-two seconds. Do you have _any_ idea how difficult it is to be rid of dark eye-circles once they form, and do you know how absolutely gorgeous the man I'm blind-dating is supposed to be? Do you? Do you understand at all the consequence of what you have done, of shoving me in here with the likes of you and charging me with an absolutely absurd statement and putting me, most unforgivably, in these handcuffs which aren't even cushioned on the sides and will make red marks on my wrists and might give my blind date a bad impression? Do you? _Do_ you, YOU _IDIOT_?"

"I'm so sorry." He shot up from his chair and dropped to his knees, "I'm so sorry, chief…"

"Fuck, get me a bottle of vodka and find a replacement for yourself. You have ninety seconds to do that or offer me your head on a platter. And, if I ever see you again, I'm going to put a bullet through your balls."

* * *

Xiaoxiao woke up to her cell-phone ringing. Her foot was sour beyond reason and her lower half was burning in pain. Suddenly she remembered how she had gotten in this state in the first place and shot the most fanatically devilish glare she could muster at the man staring at her—

And speaking of which, why was Ryuuzaki staring at her?

Suddenly her heart stopped. Could he have found conclusive evidence that she had been visiting the Pentagon? Shit, she shouldn't have left her computer unlocked… he must have stolen her hard-drive and made a copy and sent it to a decoding agency and now she was so dead, so, so, _so_—

"Good morning." He smiled.

"Uhm." She frowned, baffled. Why was he smiling?

It looked like a victorious smile.

But it couldn't be.

He found her out.

But it still just couldn't be.

It just… she was too young! She couldn't waste her brilliant, sparkling youth in jail, she couldn't be jailed, not without her computer—_please, god, don't do this to me, I don't deserve it_, she pleaded_, I've been bad, I know I've been, but you're generous, right? Right? I'll stop hacking. I'll be nice now. I'll just be a virus-catcher. Yes, yes I'll stop wasting my life away. Please, god, give me another chance and just make this evil fiend before me go away! GOD!_

"I will raise your pay by twenty dollars an hour if you do not pick up the phone." Ryuuzaki's smile grew even more alarmingly wide when Xiaoxiao frowned.

"What?" She arched an eyebrow, finally stepping off her imaginary soap box.

And then she realized that he was smiling out of fear, and grew slightly more relaxed and smug. So he wasn't going to capture her? Ah, she knew it. He wouldn't be that fast, anyway, and-

"Please do not pick up the phone." As indifferent as he sounded, it was more a plea than anything she had heard so far... which worried her. And knowing the attitude that Ryuuzaki always sported, it was probably a cue that something on earth was terribly, terribly out of place.

"Why not?" She reached for the little black box and read the Caller ID—'_Lei_'. Why was Ryuuzaki so afraid of Leila? Could it be that he had just became aware of her wrath? It could be. Leila was a dangerous, scary figure after all.

"It's okay, Ryuuzaki, she's not so bad if you just tell her the truth." Xiao attempted a gentle smile, sympathizing with the frankly very adorable fear Ryuuzaki was emitting. She felt that the two of them had something in common. Thank god for Leila, the most probable reincarnation of Hitler in an English, non-penis-sporting, police officer form.

"I see. However, please refrain from picking up the phone." Ryuuzaki hopped down from a chair and moved behind it. She realized that he was hiding from her. "Why is that?"

"Please place your trust in me." He was shrinking farther behind it, but she simply dismissed it as prejudice.

Xiao smiled cheerfully, "I'm going to be okay, Ryuuzaki. I've known her longer, anyway. You see, she's nice to her own. She's calling me just because she's a little worried."

And with that, she reached for the phone and tilted her head in an assuring manner at L, who was beginning to perspire. Was it really so bad? What did Leila do to him, anyway? It must have happened while she was sleeping. He wasn't so afraid of her before…

"Hello?" She answered, despite the desperate and suicidal look that was growing on his face.

"_Hello, I would like to order two helpings of kidney and brain from a Chinese peace ambassador, who happened to spend three hours in jail yesterday with my stolen cell-phone_."

Xiao's eyes snapped open and her hand quivered. The phone slid into her lap. She was so over. This was the end of her.

She picked up the phone to whimper into a deadly silence. "Lei, I'm so sorr—"

"_What's wrong? Is it not possible to deliver from Cambridge to London? _Or_, are you located across the ocean, Miss Liang? That's interesting, because in the note that my dear ambassador left at home, it stated quite explicitly that she was visiting a store in _Cam_bridge. So did it actually happen before she disappeared into a jail across the ocean? _EH_?_" Leila's pleasantly murderous tone sent Xiao trembling and near tears, even without Leila's classic glare and threatening hand gestures, "Please spare me—."

"_Did you know that I have a blind date today?_"

"Yes I did."

"_Do you know at what hour a bunch of idiots woke me up and dragged me into an interrogation room in handcuffs?_"

"No I don't."

"_Do you know how inhuman I look?_"

"I could imagine."

"_Do you understand that it is quite impossible to escape before my date?_"

"Y-y-y-ess…"

"_Do you know how long it took me to find someone to introduce me onto this date?_"

"No, I would never understand your magnificent efforts. I'm so sorr—"

"_Would you like to die?_"

"Yes please."

"_Then before you commit seppuku, I will advise you, you mother fucking idiot, to turn off your mother fucking phone so that it can't be fucking traced. If you're going to fucking break from the mother fucking jail, you mother fucking idiot, at least fucking do it so you won't be fucking found again._"

"I'm so sorry."

"_Why isn't your phone off?_"

"Would you like to hang up first?" Xiaoxiao offered. Her voice was weak and timid. Never mind her voice. _She_ was ready to piss her pants already, and from afar, L didn't look too much healthier.

Xiaoxiao faced the empty dial-tone and felt cold perspiration staining the back of her T-shirt. She displaced the battery from the phone, now less scared and more subtly confused.

How did Leila find out about her jail time?

More importantly, how did the police in _London_ know about it, anyway? If the police all the way in London knew about it, that meant that the police here in New York should have known about it first and reported it to them and therefore there should be police banging on her door right now, after having traced her call, and…

There wasn't.

…Which meant that whoever found her did so by examining the path that she had hacked through the police files (within hours, to boot). There was no possibility that any of the American governmental forces owned someone of such talent—because otherwise the Pentagon firewall would have been in much better shape.

So the informant must have been a private detective of sorts. But which private detective would bother working for the NYPD? She squinted, turning her head slowly to Ryuuzaki, "Ryuuzaki, you didn't happen to inform Leila of my position, did you?"

"I would not dare invoke that wrath." Ryuuzaki attempted a smile, another failed attempt, but this time Xiaoxiao did not find it funny. At all. Xiao was sure that he was the culprit. There could be no other.

"Ryuuzaki, please come here."

"I would like to refuse that offer." His voice had become a bit weaker than usual. He was actually slightly nervous, Xiao realized. There was good reason, since she was going to peel off his scortum and stitch them to his eyeballs.

And she was going to do it now.

"It was a command." She snapped, rising from the bed. Ryuuzaki suddenly darted to the other side of the room, "You have my word that I did not inform Miss Leila Bell of your current disposi—"

"_L! L, open up! We're starving and it's so cold out here!"_ A voice, clearly that of a boy, burst from behind the suite door. All the blood drained out of L's pastel face and immediately he looked rather grey.

"_That is because you decided not to wear a jacket, Mello."_ Another voice joined, slightly less excited but still that of a child.

"_Shut up, you albino pajama-sporting freak!_"

Suddenly Xiao felt like laughing. The interruption fired away her anger, and the more she contemplated about what was said, the happier she became. It must not have been a coincidence. She turned towards Ryuuzaki—no, _L_: the world's greatest _Detective L_—"It's funny, isn't it, that there are people mistaking you for a famous detective now?"

"It is certainly rather flattering." L nodded, voice a bit bigger now that he realized she wasn't going to murder him in cold blood after all.

"_L, we located the cell-phone to be in very close proximity to your room. We know you're in there, we traced your wireless receptor, so let us in!" _Yet another voice. A trio?

Xiao frowned at the first sentence. Located the cell-phone…Her eyes widened. Suddenly she realized she was in an intricate situation once again.

She snorted as everything began unraveling in her brain. So those children were the ones who submitted the phone information to the police. No wonder they pointed to Leila-they simply did not understand the witch's wrath. But for L to know about it before hand meant that he must have known these children, which meant that he was indeed L. It was more than enough proof. Ryuuzaki was a Detective. Ryuuzaki was L.

Xiao tried to analyze the situation

If L opened the door and answered, he would be insinuating that he was L. Consequently, she would be able to innocently question why he was pretending to own a company—though they both knew the answer already—and would be able to stop him from spying on her with good reason. After all, if it was clear that he was investigating her, she could hide her actions for the reason of privacy. However, if it was unannounced that he was a detective, her hiding things would only be proof of conscious guilt.

"_L, we really did find the jail-breaking ambassador's phone signal here!"_

But if L opened the door, the children outside would most likely lock her in jail for the rest of her life on the charge of breaking from jail and messing with governmental files. And from there, Leila would probably visit her once every month to rip out her spleen and feed it to the scavengers outside. Further, she would be deprived of her computer and stuck with herds of people who didn't even understand how to speak in Java.

On the other hand, if the door opened, L would never be able to prove her to be a hacker—since she would already be in jail. Xiao felt, somewhere within her, that to L, nothing was more important than pinning her down and winning his case. He could probably care less if he had to bail her out of jail every day to do it.

"_Open up, sheesh, what are you doing in there anyway?" _

So then it was in both of their best interests to keep the door shut, Xiao concluded.

L seemed to have reached the same conclusion and did not respond to the cries from the outside. Instead, he began packing up his things—which consisted only of a laptop and candy—into a suitcase from nowhere. Xiao believed that he was trying to hide his things and pretend that he wasn't there. It wasn't a shabby move. She watched with amusement as L darted around the door at surprising speed, given his obviously disabling hunchback.

But when he began taking his shirt off, Xiao's smile disappeared completely, "What are you doing?"

"You see me very clearly. Please join." He responded, as if it was the most obvious choice to make—which was completely unbelievable, since he was insinuating that they were to fake…

Xiao's face twitched, "You wanna _die_?"

"I'm quite sure you would be the one in most harm if the door was opened. And from what I can gather, the children outside seem intelligent enough to break the lock to this room and determined enough to do so, if it is not opened within three minutes."

"_L, we can hear your voice! Are you with a woman? Why is a girl in there with you_"

"That's…" Xiao dropped her voice when L put a finger to his lips—in a creepily adorable fashion—and pushed a DVD into the player below the television. He turned on the TV and a voice—not too different from his own—erupted from the speakers.

"_L! IS THERE A WHORE IN THERE WITH YOU? LET ME IN, I'LL EXTERMINATE HER FOR YOU! DAMNED AMERICAN PROSTITUTES-!"_

"From the sounds of it, those children outside would not leave unless they saw something entirely inappropriate. They seem intelligent enough to begin questioning why you have a room that is registered under a male name, Ryuuzaki, if you were doing something as mundane as sleeping. They would therefore report you for swindling hotel rooms. However, if we seem to be in a completely inappropriate act, they would act out of shock and leave immediately without thought. We may exploit that time to depart so that, by the time they regain enough composure to return, we would have moved far enough to be out of touch." L whispered.

Xiao groaned silently. The situation was unbelievable—and to an obsessive hacker which she was, who had never even held hands with a person of the opposite gender, it was downright absurd.

"_Well, we're coming in!"_

"_Two bucks says you can't hack open it within three minutes."_

"_You're on."_

But it was also necessary. It was obvious that she had to cooperate. L dimmed the lights and crawled onto the bed in his jeans. Xiaoxiao began quickly pulling off her shirt when she heard the familiar tapping of the keyboard. They really were going to hack into the hotel's lock system.

L had already covered himself completely with a blanket when she dropped her clothing on the floor and crawled into the bed next to him. He lifted a side of the blanket, letting her in as if it was the most normal thing to do.

"Move up." He ordered. She followed, expecting him to do so as well. However, he moved lower until she felt his hair brushing against her stomach.

She twitched and gasped every time he brushed against her as he attempted to crawl on top of her, into some awkward intercourse position. Xiao wasn't sure which of them knew better; it seemed rather clear to her, from the look on his face, that he was just as lost was she was.

"Do you know what you're even doing?" She yelped harshly.

"Your bra is still on." He whispered from his position below the blanket. Xiao felt his breath on her thigh and wanted to cry, "Do you realize where your head is?"

"This is the only position where I can cover my face to prevent being recognized. Please cooperate and open your legs." His voice was lower now, but still as indifferent as before. Xiao dragged the blanket completely over his head and took off her bra, "I'm done."

"Breathe heavily." He ordered from underneath the blanket.

"Shut up." Xiao didn't need him to tell her to breathe heavily. She was already near tears, perspiring, quivering, and her face felt ready to explode. It was an act, she reminded herself, an act. Once those kids see this, they will be out and gone and—_beep_.

The door slammed open. She pretended not to notice. She felt L's nails dig into her thigh and hollered in pain—"AH! What are you _DOING_?"

"Oh…"

Upon hearing the small voice she suddenly remembered that there were visitors and twisted her head towards them, quickly covering her breasts—which were rather flat, anyway—"Who the hell are you?"

"Ah, we're s-s-so…sorry…" Of the three children crowded five meters away from her, the blonde one looked the most petrified. The small, white one reminded her rather of L, with his completely indifferent look, and the red-head had barely finished his apology before snapping around and dashing for the door. The two others followed quickly, slamming the door with a loud bang after them.

It had all happened so quickly Xiao was left in disbelief. L, however, seemed to be in better shape. Within seconds he was already out of the blanket and redressing himself. Xiao could only swear and follow him, more out of competitiveness than desire. In truth she just wanted to bury her head in the blankets and die right there.

Within two minutes they were in the elevator, both sulking in a heavy atmosphere.

"I had previously believed that all women shaved their legs." L mumbled, at his corner of the cage.

"You should complain less while your pants are still tight around the crotch." Xiao snickered, staring down the buttons on the elevator panel. The reflection of the old lady behind them revealed a petrified face.

"It is very witty of you to make such a remark, Xiao, especially since you seem so flustered to even pretend to undergo the foreplay section of sexual intercourse. I find it of interest that someone as naïve as you can simultaneously make comments that give yourself the image of someone very well versed in fornification."

"Even a veteran prostitute would be upset to have someone of your caliber at her vagina."

"Is that why you were secreting such an incredible amount of mucous?"

"That's a biological reaction."

"Then I will say the same for my erection."

"Why did you pinch me, then?"

"You did not sound very natural. I imagine a woman having another's tongue on her clitoris to sound slightly more pleasured."

There was a thump. Neither turned around to help the old lady who had fainted.

"Ah, by the way, why did you have to hide your face? You do realize, Ryuuzaki, that this increases the possibility of your identity as L, don't you?"

"Please do not over analyze." The elevator doors slid open. They walked out at the same time, neither yielding an inch to the other, as L continued, "I simply desired to hide my face during pretense of sexual intercourse."

"Are you calling me shameless?" Xiao snapped as the two began walking faster and faster, each trying to surpass the speed of the other without admitting it.

"That would be rude." L and Xiao squeezed out the entrance at the same time, nearly running over a two-year old toddler, who watched in amazement as what seemed to be two original circus animals zoomed out of the hotel, completely in sync, "And why are you so sensitive about the possibility that I am L?"

"Because we're hacking into the Pentagon, which might be a case that L would look into. That's all." Xiaoxiao snarled.

"Since we are only developing the software, I believe that L will be looking into our employers, if the software is used. On the other hand, I believe that if L so desired to jail us for attempting to hack into the Pentagon, he could do so within seconds."

"Is that so? I wonder why we are not jailed yet. Is it because L is incapable?"

Xiao held down a giggle when L's eyebrows scrunched together for a split second, "No, it is simply because L is not particularly interested in arresting you."

"Is that true? He's not interested in sticking me in prison?" Xiao peered into L's eyes.

L returned with a smile, "Perhaps."

There was a short pause, during which both suddenly remembered that Ryuuzaki was still only Ryuuzaki. L added hesitantly, "Since I am not L, I cannot say for certain."


	5. Chapter 5: Truffles and Nudity

**Chapter Five: Truffles and Nudity **

* * *

It had been a week exactly. One week of nothing productive—or rather, one week of watching Xiaoxiao Liang feign stupidity and reread introductory C++ manuals and ask how to turn on a desktop. There was absolutely no point in hiring her to hack into the Pentagon, L realized, as she was here to milk his money completely dry and then pretend to have no idea how to do it.

L dropped another sugar cube into his already over-sweetened coffee and flinched mechanically as soon as he heard the much too familiar "L, L come here!"

L tried his best to ignore the impish calls mushrooming behind him from the treacherous mouth of the greatest, and only, mistake he had ever made.

"You know, there's really no point to denying your real identity. Right, Ryuuzaki?" She yanked him around with one hand when he failed to turn to face her, "I mean, even if you pretend to be my boss, I'm still going to hide things from you. In fact, it's such a lose for you if you keep being my boss—because between a detective and an employer, the employer's the one who usually gets blamed for sexual harassment."

L arched an eyebrow. He knew where this was going…

"And, you know, I can't say that nothing happened between the two of us, L. Oh, you were so rough back there in the hotel, and in front of the poor children…you're such a beast, L!" She threw her head back and laughed to the enormous, disgusted blank L was drawing over his face.

"Is that everything?"

"By the way, I found this in your computer." She presented him her laptop, "Go ahead."

He was vaguely suspicious of her massive grin, but did as told anyway. A moment later he sat face to face with facsimile reproductions of all the copies of criminal investigation reports he had written—and, on the window in the front, the contract which the Pentagon had signed with him for catching—

L jerked his head up, subtly pleased. At least she had progressed from doodling pandas, which she claimed to be her direct relatives, on his laptop… although a bit too far. L wasn't sure if he liked the present Xiao (her usual computer-hacking, oblivious-to-private-property self) or the one a day ago (who was singing a Beatles song so loudly that L could hear it a floor below the bathroom) better.

"How did you find this, exactly?" L asked absentmindedly.

"Well, they were kind of scattered haphazardly and…" She gestured somewhat with her hands, flinging them about to show that it was really L's fault for making his hidden files so accessible, not hers for prying into a _locked_ computer in the first place.

"And did you hack into my computer to find this?"

"Well…"

"Did you know that hacking into personal property here in America has the same legal repercussions as trespassing private property—up to fifteen years in jail with a five hundred thousand-dollar fine?" L tried to replay the trick he had used with the hidden cameras a few days ago, when the two were caught together in the London Police station. However, by the gleaming smile on Xiao's face, L could tell that she had already learned her lesson… and excellently so.

"And, did you know that signing a fake contract with an employee and pulling a company out of your ass counts as fraud, and can lead you up to _twenty_ years of jail-time per offense? Well, you do the math, L, because I think detectives are probably better at adding up jail times, especially since you'll be staying there for two centuries."

L could foresee the rest of the debate—the two of them would be stuck at picking at illegal actions the other had taken prior to their own. And at the rate that the two of the committed crimes, there would be plenty to pick at—only god knew how long Xiao planed to milk it.

Xiao reclaimed her laptop and began skipping away with it, stopping at the door to flash him a victorious smirk, "Anyway, between the two of us, you were in the wrong first. Well, I suppose _I_ did start hacking into the Pentagon first, but hey—since you don't have any proof of that—technically you started it all with your Gummy&Bear Corporation."

And then L realized it, a second too late, like noticing that a spit wad was in fact a spit wad when it was a mere half inch from joining your eyeball.

She had confessed.

_She confessed hacking into the Pentagon_, L repeated to himself. That was an open challenge towards him. It was like pasting an "I'M AN AFGHAN SUICIDE BOMBER, YOU MOTHER FUCKERS!" banner on her own head and dancing gleefully before an American S.W.A.T. team. At this point it was obvious she was itching to get caught… or rather, to see him try to catch her.

L stared at Xiao, who reflected his gaze back mercilessly. They must have had been at it for minutes before L suddenly discerned the true implications of her confession.

And, when he did, he could barely hold down a lopsided smirk. It seemed as if she hadn't meant to dig that grave on purpose, because suddenly the smile on her face began dropping at the speed of a dead bird. The look of panic that was consuming her face only fueled L's malicious grin.

L knew that, as a gentleman, he probably should not take advantage of the slip-of-mouth which came along with her confession. But it wasn't as if she was so much of a lady either, and L knew that if she was in his position, she would never let it go. And so, L didn't let it go either.

"Well, as you have _confessed_ to hacking the Pentagon, that gives me sufficient proof to demand for a warrant to place you under arrest. It takes twenty-four hours for a warrant to be issued, but since the Pentagon is top-priority, there is no doubt my request will be granted in a dozen."

The look of paranoia on Xiao's face had now officially vaporized, leaving a coy smile to which L found no response. Dear lord, was she actually _happy_? L found himself at a loss.

Xiao curtsied clumsily, the coy smile growing into something of a Godzilla, face-splitting grin, as she spun around, "Since you don't have a warrant _now_, I'll be taking my leave."

"Would you like a drive towards your destination, perhaps?" L offered to her quickly disappearing figure. A contemptuous laugh followed, echoing through the hallways, "Are you offering me a ride as a detective, who is trying to hunt me down, or as a boss, who is trying to get into my pants?"

"Someone begging for a ride, like you are, is in no position to insult her caregiver. I will be waiting outside. And please drop that finger—it is rather unladylike." L smiled to himself at the lack of response, imagining the look of disgust on her face as she probably did drop a finger.

* * *

"Using the international airport might be a better choice than the bus station. After all, you are now officially America's Most Wanted." L advised once the car pulled to a stop.

"Why, that's incredibly flattering. When'd you get the chance to broadcast our marriage?" She snarled rather unpleasantly as she kicked the door open.

"I was quite serious. That's your face on the television screen." L pointed his gaze at a flat-screen TV hanging on the wall of the bus station. Xiao's face was flashed there for barely half a second, with her name and age and height, before the commercials went up.

However, it seemed as if the Chinese girl didn't even bother to look up from dragging her suitcase out of the car's trunk.

"You don't happen to have any cash on you, right?" She suddenly demanded, thrusting her hands into the pockets of his jeans without permission. L felt violated and, strangely enough, also an enormous urge to smile, "No."

"Do you also want to pretend to be a loan shark, in addition to my boss and detective?" She pleaded, clasping her hands together with a bright smile. It was almost foreign compared to the face which was frozen in stubborn frustration just minutes ago.

"I left a blank checkbook in your backpack."

She grinned sheepishly, "You know, it's really obvious you're more interested in helping me run off than catching me."

"Since I will be arresting you sooner or later, I'd also like to help you run as far as possible to extend the enjoyable process of catching you."

"Why, hello, L's ego! I didn't know you had a voice!" Xiao mumbled, grinning from ear to ear, "Let's make a bet."

"Yes?"

"For thirty minutes from now you may do absolutely nothing." She waited for a reaction. He said nothing.

She continued grimly, though her eyes were sparkling with excitement, "But, after thirty minutes, you are free to call the FBI and CIA and all the Russian spies on the North American continent to find me. If you can have me in handcuffs, which must be personally dawned by the Great Detective L, by nine o'clock sharp tomorrow morning, you can ask three things of me. And I won't deny. On the other hand, if you find me after then, you will get me out of jail and somehow dismiss all my charges of hacking into the Pentagon. For free."

"That is an absurd trade-off." L stated blatantly, though Xiaoxiao looked completely serious, "I know."

"Fine." L conceded. He knew he was just as excited to win as the woman before him, if not more. This was a level of entertainment he had never had a chance to enjoy before; it was an actual _hunt_.

Thrilling.

Xiaoxiao Liang marched off upon hearing his agreement, without another look back. L watched until Xiao and her luggage disappeared into a bus completely and opened his phone with two germaphobic fingers.

* * *

The moment Xiao entered the bus station L felt at the top of the world. Unbeknownst to his former employee, he had now informed every security personnel in the transportation services of a high-risk suspect in their system and the need to monitor their tapes. He had given them pictures and profiles of Xiaoxiao Liang, complete with voice-recording.

There was not a chance in hell the Asian girl could get away, even _if _she was an ambassador. All the bus and taxi drivers on the east coast now had her face by heart.

L could see it in his mind's eye. By nine o'clock tomorrow he would walk quietly into wherever she had thought was the cleverest place to hide and hold up a pair of handcuffs, and she would try to logic her way through it but eventually give up and he could then have her at his will.

Justice is served.

L took a sip of his coffee and opened his computer, about to view to the security tapes which he had ordered to be sent directly to his laptop. He wanted to watch her movements first hand and read her mind. It was the most basic trick: catch a criminal by being the criminal.

He watched in silence as she bought tickets, argued with the retailer about the price, and then marched off into the woman's washroom. In ten minutes she boarded the bus towards Central Station—albeit in a strange fashion, walking inside backwards (with her back facing the inside and chest facing the door). When she sat down she immediately opened her laptop.

L chuckled—she couldn't do much with it at this point. He had made copies of her hard-drive, so her trying to erase evidence of having visited the Pentagon would be useless.

But, after a few minutes, she suddenly shut her laptop and dragged her luggage off with her from the bus. L frowned. What was she doing? Maybe she had taken the wrong one. But the probability of that was definitely less than forty…

L gazed, lost, she climbed back onto the bus two minutes later.

What was going on? Thankfully, the bus was empty, which gave L plenty of opportunity to narrow his sights on her. The silence lasted another four minutes before other passengers began boarding and, finally, the driver hopped on.

She seemed relatively composed throughout the entire ride and departed on the fourth stop, at DuParc Garden. L sent out a notice to all taxi drivers and security personnel in the area, ordering them to follow her movements exactly.

However, when even after ten minutes, not a single person gave him a notice about seeing or picking up an Asian woman in an odd T-shirt and jeans ripped past repair, L began growing slightly worried. Did she walk off on foot? She might do that, to avoid him. In that case, he was in terrible luck, due to the massive number of transfer buses located within walking distance from the area.

But Xiao wasn't the type to do something like that. To Xiao anything physical was too taxing. Walking a mile, for an apartment-confined computer-addict, was equivalent to hiking up and down the Great Walls forty times. Add in a few suitcases and she might as well just drop dead on the spot. But there wasn't much else to do if she was to trying to avoid all the surveillance cameras for eleven hours.

L frowned. His intuition said that something was going to be off. There was something wrong. He rewound the tape to when she had arrived on the bus and walked off the bus and realized—

He had been had. He had been completely, _completely_ had.

She had walked on the bus in such a way so that, when the tape was rewound, it would be a video of her walking off the bus. She was therefore able to copy and paste her image into the surveillance tapes at the DuParc stop. In reality, she probably had not gotten off at all. In fact, she had been on her laptop not to erase evidence, but to doctor tapes.

L bit his thumb, nibbling on it without any ease as one side of his brain bombarded questions at the other. Was she still on the bus, then? Yes, she must still be on the bus.

L smiled suddenly, realizing that technology was working in his favor after all. Xiao could hide her image on tape, but she couldn't hide her shadow.

All the seats in the back row were occupied, so Xiao must have sat somewhere near the middle or the front. L recalled that she had a relatively large suitcase. Therefore, she must have sat on aisle seats in order to free up the window seats for other passengers. If she sat in the front, then passengers getting off the bus would have to walk around her suitcase—as has been demonstrated in prior stops. Therefore, if she had erased herself and her suitcase, then L would be able to see passengers unnaturally walking around an invisible object. That would mean that she was still on the bus.

Additionally, the stop at which she departs would show a line of passengers seemingly waiting for nothing, congested at the back of the bus (while in actuality waiting for Xiao to struggle out of the bus), and then suddenly moving out (when Xiao finally escapes the bus, probably swearing about her heavy suitcase).

L folded his fingers together and felt it all coming into his hands.

Xiao could hide her image, but she couldn't hide her existence. He combed through the tapes with great detail—and found it. She hadn't gotten off DuParc Garden. Her abandoned seat was left wide open, despite the crowded bus. Furthermore, boarding passengers looked at the "empty" seat for a while (a bit longer than he expected) and moved on hesitantly, walking around an invisible parcel next to the seat on the aisle. The invisible-on-tape Xiao must have sat there, then.

And so L scrutinized the tapes, feeling rather productive and victorious. However, the sense of victory disappeared when he realized that the seat remained empty even at the second to last stop. Did that mean that Xiao was planning to get off at the last stop? But the last stop was the bus station, where L had dropped her off…

L frowned, suddenly lost. Why would Xiao go through all the efforts to hide herself if she wasn't going to do much at all? L studied the scene of the last stop. It was more than strange.

If Xiao was in her seat as he had imagined, there must have been people moving extra-slowly behind her as she struggled her way to the door. However, all the passengers hopped off at normal walking paces, which meant that Xiao must have waited for everyone to get off. However, the door shut as soon as the last passenger departed… which meant that Xiao wasn't one of the last. The bus driver did not pick up his microphone to shoo anyone off, which meant that Xiao had left the bus… without getting off. L frowned.

Xiao hadn't been on the bus at all?

L's eyes opened wide, thoughts running in a noisy havoc around his brain and crashing into one another. What was going on? Why had that seat been left empty, then? But it must have been Xiao sitting in it—but why didn't he ever notice her getting off? Or did she really get off at DuParc?

Suddenly L realized that he was on the losing side of the bet. But he did still have another trick up his sleeve.

* * *

Xiao sipped a latte happily in her hotel room as she read the instructions for installing a listening device. Imagining the look on L's face filled her with delight. There was no way on earth he could guess that she was actually living just a floor below him.

_An hour ago…_

_Xiao could barely stifle a laugh when she overheard a bus driver's walkie talkie: "X.L. CONFIRMED TO BE ON BUS 345B—_SSSHT_—ALL SECURITY PERSONNEL DIRECT FORCES TO ROUTE 345—_BZZZT_." She caught the bus driver's frightened gaze in the mirror as they stood side by side, soaping their hands in the washroom. After glimpsing a photo of herself (not a flattering one, to boot) in the hands of a security guard, Xiaoxiao knew immediately what L was up to._

_It was unfair, technically, that he was watching her with the eyes of a thousand cameras and a few more thousand bus drivers and janitors and ticket-sellers. But, she had agreed to it, after all. At least he didn't take it literally and begin bombarding her bus with CIA agents._

_Xiaoxiao sighed and climbed onto 325B. She had planned originally to go to Central Station, and there mingle in and disappear by blacking out the security cameras for two hours—during which she would have ample time to get far away from L's possible allies. _

_But obviously the plan had changed. She didn't expect L to follow her so closely, and even inform the poor, confused bus drivers. She tapped her forefinger against her lap impatiently, trying to come up with a plan until she realized that L was probably watching the security tapes through his laptop, which meant that he was using a wireless signal to connect to the bus station's security cameras, which meant that it was hackable._

_To Xiao, the word "hackable" was like the word "edible" to a two-year old, which was like the word "START!" for an Olympic sprinter. The moment her brain fired off the "hackable" signal she was on auto-drive, tapping away excitedly on her laptop and wiggling inside everywhere she wasn't supposed to be. _

_Within moments she had gotten a hold of L's lines, and could see his screen from her own. So he was watching her, after all, and even had the cameo on her zoomed in extra-close. The tapes were muted—no sound available, the box said—and Xiao realized that she could use it all to her advantage._

_She snuck around a bit more, using his computer to view the security cameras in all the other buses. She noted that, like the one in which she sat, all buses were dead empty. There was another bus in particular that looked remarkably like 345B. In fact, the view from its security camera, when merged over the view for 345B's, fit perfectly. Not even a piece of trash was out of order. _

_And then the idea came to mind. _

_Xiao set up a timer, ordering a "tape-switch" in two minutes sharp between the bus in which she sat—345B—and its twin, 398D. Since there was no camera between the buses, she could easily switch buses and make it look as if she had merely gotten off of 345 to get back on it. But there was a risk: if anyone stepped on either bus during the two minutes, the switching of the tape would be as obvious as hell (with people disappearing off one bus to magically appear in another within a split second) and L would be chuckling at her failure from afar. Then again, it wasn't as if she was left with many other options._

_And so, having completed her homework, she shut her laptop and skipped off, swearing about the weight of her suitcase. In three minutes she climbed aboard the fortunately still-empty 398D. From her seat she peered into 345B and noticed that, as planned, it was empty as well. She smiled to herself. L was probably wondering why she left the bus and came back on for no reason. No, he was probably over-thinking it. _

Xiao understood, even with the little time that she had spent with him, that L was one who had always over-estimated others… which had usually always worked to an advantage for him. However, for Xiao, it wouldn't be—as she was keen on exploiting it and confusing the living shit out of him.

_Within minutes other passengers began piling on. Soon the bus departed, during which Xiao occupied herself with writing a Crime-Scene-Evidence-Do-Not-Touch note on L's stationary (that she stole while she snuck around his "company"). _

"_Next stop, Grand Palace Hotel. Passengers, please take your bags and prepare to depart." The automatic machine declared. Xiao blinked, aware that it was the hotel in which L stayed. She couldn't hold down her smile. Within seconds she taped her "DO NOT TOUCH" note to the chair and hopped off the bus together with her suitcase._

_She marched promptly back into the hotel, ordering a room right beneath L's under the name of "Ryuu Kazi." For seconds she considered that maybe she was too cruel… but that was before she remembered his pompous_: 'Since I will be catching you sooner or later, I'd also like to help you run as far as possible to extend the enjoyable process of catching you.'

* * *

Watari knew that L was no longer on top of them game by looking at L's reflection in the limousine's mirror. His face, though expressionless, was tense. The detective was hunched over his seat in his normal thinking position and had a thumb in his mouth as he pried his eyes into the computer screen.

Watari leaned his head into the headset. This was the first time he had seen L so focused, which was rather disappointing, as this was probably the least threatening case L had faced in his career. After all, a mere, motive-less girl hacking into the Pentagon to display obscene messages about the central staff's undergarments once a week for entertainment was hardly worth looking into. If it wasn't the Pentagon, she would probably have been sent to the detention room in some high school office and that would be the end of it.

Yet, somehow, L had been spending more time on Xiao's case than any other. A case that could have ended a week ago was now, somehow, in a dramatic bet that Watari felt was definitely going to do _something _to L's career—good or bad, the old man couldn't say.

Watari jumped when, suddenly, L's voice filled the room.

"Yes, this is Detective L… please broadcast what I say next immediately. '_Xiaoxiao Liang, twenty-one years old, of Chinese decent, height five foot six inches, have recently escaped an isolation ward. She is currently diseased with an evolved strand of the Ebola virus, which is ten times as infectious and as fatal as the mother virus. Anyone who comes within audible distance of Miss Liang must call 492-093-8273 as soon as possible with their current location and the time of contact._'"

Watari frowned. What was L trying to pull off now? Terrorize an entire state into cooperating with him?

"Yes, I have sent you a photo of Xiaoxiao Liang… Please post this quickly, as it is urgent... Thank you…Goodbye." There was a pause, "Watari, back to the hotel."

Watari nodded, though secretly worried for L. The way L was acting was a bit too spontaneously—he was now more similar to his suspect than himself. And, of all people, L was the least likely to be influenced. So who _exactly_ was Xiaoxiao Liang?

* * *

It took but ten minutes until he had gathered all the necessary information, sent a message to CNN taking back his previous statement and apologizing for 'a mistake,' and grabbed a pair of handcuffs. He waited impatiently for the elevator.

Xiaoxiao Liang had probably turned off all her digital devices in order to avoid him. Since L had never observed the Chinese girl even once watching television, he knew that it wasn't likely that she heard of his stunt while she locked herself away.

It was too bad that she was going to have to hear it with a pair of handcuffs.

L could not have been happier as he approached the door. Xiao was in there. This time he was sure. She had even booked the room under Ryuu Kazi, to mock him. L wondered what expression would be on her face as he opens the door—surprise, maybe, or anticipated defeat and depression. The door was unlocked, so he stepped inside without knocking. A brief glance revealed her to indeed still be inside. Her luggage was all over the place—backpack open, suitcase half unpacked, and a sandwich barely eaten on the table, next to a plate of…it couldn't be… but…

Raspberry Truffles with chocolate filling and freshly melted caramel topping, powdered sugar, and glazed berries and almonds! L's eyes widened as he scampered forwards, towards the marvelous plate.

He reminded himself that he was here for Xiao, and this was very likely one of her ploys. But, what could she possibly put inside the truffles? Poison can only be inserted into baked goods like these if the goods were homemade. And, L knew, there was no way in hell someone like Xiao could ever have the patience to construct such a work of art. Plus, how would she be able to get her hands on poison within a few hours, anyway? (L did secretly check her suitcase just before she left.)

L studied the desert and glanced quickly at the noted beneath it:

"_Dearest boss,_

_Please present the world with a more beautiful photo of me next time. I suggest the one with me in the obnoxious yellow summer dress, in which I am actually smiling and the sun highlights my tastefully-styled hair. Also, can't you give me the Black Death or something? Ebola's getting a little old._

_Love, _

_The fake-molested employee._

_PS: Don't you dare eat touch those truffles. They're poisoned with cyanide. I promise, if you have them, you're going to want to kill yourself for the rest of your life."_

L recognized immediately the incongruity in her threat. It was obvious she wasn't used to threatening others outside of making immature comments on the computer. If the truffles really had cyanide, L would drop dead first and have no chance to want to kill himself later. Therefore—

L smiled. Perhaps they were somewhat toxic, though. After all, Xiao was the type to enjoy irony. He stared at the delicacies. Perhaps he could… yes, he could just smell them. And when he finds her, he will eat them in front of her.

And so, he picked up a truffle with two fingers and brought it to his nose. He took one whiff and—

L opened his eyes to a blood-curdling scream. What had happened to him? He remembered clearly smelling a truffle and now there was an old lady at a door far away from him and he couldn't move his limbs and…

He understood immediately why she was screaming. He was stripped completely naked, with not even the mercy of his underwear. An undersized pillow covered his crotch, behind which strands of his pubic hair poked out.

The truffles lay inches away from his mouth, but his four limbs were tied down—arms to the headboard, legs to the bedposts. He turned to the cleaning lady, attempting a smile, "Excuse me, but… could you…"

"NO!" She shrieked and scampered off, dropping her mop on the floor with a flop. L sighed at the predicted failure. What time was it? There was some sunlight through the curtains. Cleaning ladies usually come in the morning—He froze. It _couldn't_ be.

L twisted his neck, trying to take a glimpse of the clock on the wall and to calculate the probability that it was nine o'clock. However, when he saw the hour hand, his face turned completely pale.


	6. Chapter 6: On the Topic of Transvestites

**Chapter Six: On the Topic of Transvestites **

**Asimosan's Corner**: Greetings! Sorry for the long wait. My plot bunny mutated and turned into a gianormous octopus and threatened to eat off mankind and I was off fighting a classic war of good and evil (being good, of course) and was seriously injured and was nursed back to health by an unknown creature who I didn't get to catch the name of and... yeah...

* * *

Instead of meeting the clock, L's gaze crept unexpectedly onto the territory of a pair of solid blue, sparkling eyes.

_Mello_?

The name alone sent L's brain into spasms and paralyzed the rest of his body. Never in his life had he felt so humiliated before: how_ could_ she.

L's nose pricked up at the sight of the three children before him and his mouth slid open, moving without sound. He wanted—no, _needed_—to say something rational and plausible that would immediately alleviate the situation and quickly shift the attention from him—

That thought lasted until a corner of his brain piped up with "_Yo, does anyone realize that we're naked _and_ bound here? S-r-s, all we need is some wax and we'll make a great BDSM—"_ and was beat up good and well for the information.

"L, would you like a hand?" Near offered and Mello smacked the sheep over the head. A dull thud preceded vicious whispers about sexual innuendos and wanting to be stabbed to death by a rosemary.

After having silenced the shorter one, Mello tried and failed to display an awkward smile of comfort, "Uh, would you like to be untied?"

"Yes." L nodded. L quickly replaced his gaze on the clock; there was no need to worry more about a situation that had already turned out for the worst, after all. If he loses time, then everything was o—

_No_, it was already past ten? But that was impossible—the light which streamed through the window made shadows that were too long—it was definitely before ten… which meant—was Xiao screwing with him on purpose?

It made sense in retrospect. Any normal human being, after going on display butt-naked and bound before three genius teenagers would have gone crazy after realizing the discrepancy. Then again, normal was the polar opposite of the fitting adjective for L.

"Matt, do you have the time?" L mumbled, lifting his head to catch the red-head's eyes. Well, he didn't really need to catch Matt's eyes. It wasn't as if the younger kid wasn't staring horrifically at his bush of pubic hair already. Matt quickly snapped out of it and glanced at his watch and back at L, "It's eight-twenty."

L was busy thinking about how to sack the rest of Xiao's life for screwing with him when Near's voice popped into his dimension, "L? L, we met your girlfri—_ow_—your roman—_ow_—the woman that we saw with you last time, Xiaoxiao Liang, on our way here. In fact, she informed us of your coordinates and instructed us to pass onto you a message."

"And that would be…?" L had a bad feeling about this.

Mello cut in, mimicking Xiao's voice with frightening accuracy—"_Dear boss, for your donating Ebola onto my records, I will be donating sexual deviance onto yours. Now, slave these children around and dress nicely. Good day!_"

Slave the children around and dress nicely? Did it really mean what it said, or was there some other kind of message to it? And speaking of messages—

L's eyes turned a livid shade of black. He scrambled off the bed, still naked, and dashed from one end of the hotel to the next.

He finally found his laptop at the foot of the bed on which he had been tied. It was half open, and as he had feared, Xiao had probably…

"NYPD! THIS IS THE NYPD, OPEN UP! OPEN UP, RYUUZAKI RUE! YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR JAILBREAKING AND—"

L's eyes widened to uneven sizes and he dashed around the suite at super human speed. After realizing that his clothing was nowhere to be found, he finally stopped short and stepped into the shower, dashed out, wrapped a towel around his waist, and swung the door open to greet the group of officers.

In L's world, this was the perfect plan. If he appeared casual and collected, and in inappropriate attire, the police would first be confused, then be embarrassed, and then simply leave out of a sudden lack of confidence. Plus, he was a man. The towel wrapped around his waist showed proudly his (somehow) toned upper-half, which didn't have anything soft or near-bulgy. If anything, he trusted the officers to be able to tell that he was the farthest thing possible from a psychotic Chinese woman.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen. May I help you?" L smiled smoothly. It was a neat trick Xiaoxiao used to delay him, and it might have worked if he was female, since the cops would probably drag him to jail and stick him there well past the time of the bet. But L, by the look on the officer's face, knew that the delay wouldn't last long enough.

However, the look of shock soon migrated onto his face when the officer continued, more stuttering but continuing nonetheless: "Y-you a-a-are under a-arrest for j-jailbreaking and—"

L couldn't let the idiot continue. He turned to the man who was obviously the head of the unit, smiling calmly.

It will end. This mistaken façade will end.

After all, didn't they notice his flat chest? His manly legs? If they were so dim, he had to enlighten them: "Gentlemen, I believe that the person for whom you are looking is female and of Asian decent—"

"OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. THE THREE CHILDREN IN THE BACK WILL BE ARRESTED AS YOUR ACCOMPLICES." The head of the unit barked back loudly, shouting not without pride, "Don't think you'll confuse us just because you were dressed up as a woman last time. Heh, we're on our guard now. You won't run away in a century, Ryuuzaki, now that L's on your back."

And that was how L finally revealed his face to the world—consisting of NBC, MBN, CNN, ABC, and FOX. Not as Detective L, of course, but as a sexual deviant and transvestite, Ryuuzaki Rue, who had three mini-accomplices and who had hacked his way out of jail for robbery and assault.

* * *

"Guess who won our bet, handsome?" Xiao beamed, twenty-two hours afterwards. L sat across the glass window, hands cuffed and remarkably badass looking, with his bed-hair and eye-circles and all.

"Was it impossible to visit under the identity of a sibling?"

Xiao didn't know if the look in L's eyes was intent or murderous, "Well, I figured that we're more like a married couple."

Awkward Pause.

"…I mean, we don't look alike enough to be related."

"Actually, the probability of my marrying someone of your caliber, Xiao, is zero point _zero_ percent. A similar value to taking e to the x with x approaching negative infinity, except less."

"Actually, you're quite right. No one in their right mind would marry a sexually deviant, jail-hacking, old lady-robbing transvestite like you, Ryuuzaki." Xiao smiled, "Anyway, it looks like you lost some weight, Mr. Transvestite. Are you getting ready for the cameras or what?"

"I am faring terribly and my brain has foreclosed due to low blood sugar. My probability of death within the next week has risen by seven percent due to the high energy expenditure which is required in order to lob a conversation with you, Xiao." L deadpanned, though Xiao's smile did not drop a single watt. She looked as elated as ever, wearing an obnoxiously bright neon green shirt with jeans in worse condition than those that L toss into the trash.

"Well, that's too bad. I still need you to clear some charges for me, remember?" Xiao winked, referring to her victory in the bet for the second time in fifteen seconds. And then her voice dropped a notch, which L diagnosed to be the I'm-telling-the-truth version of Xiao's speech, "Also, life's boring without a bossy freak trolling around. Get out quick."

"If memory serves correctly, you were the one who put me in here."

"No, _L _was the one who put you in here, Ryuuzaki. The voice scrambler on your laptop, by the way, is pure love. It actually makes me sound like a man!"

"There is nothing remarkably ladylike about Xiao anyways." L noted on the side, to earn a stabbing glare from the girl across.

"I don't mind what you say. Only real gentlemen could differentiate ladies from commoners."

"One does not need eyes of a king to realize that a handful of mud contains no diamonds."

"You little weener, I'm going to peel off your scrotum and stitch it over your mouth and nose later so you can die in the reek of your own fucking balls."

L smiled, "Why, I look forward to that. However, I have to profess that I find your objective highly unachievable, especially since this glass mirror is going to be the smallest barrier between us from now on."

"Don't worry, baby." Xiao whined in a new melodramatic tone that really made L want to vomit the few spoons of table sugar he stole earlier from the cafeteria. To his horror, she actually had more to say in the same voice, "We can still make love. Heart to heart."

"I am concerned about the length of time which you took to practice that tone."

"It's beautifully sweet, isn't it? Doesn't it make you want to run away?"

A twitch.

A glance.

A subtle smile. "Yes, it does…"

"If only there was an electric outage, eh? I heard all the doors here were digitalized. Wouldn't that be the perfect chance?"

"I would advise you to stop brainstorming. I will not be compensating for any work you do at the moment, as Watari is coming to release me soon." L declared. It was partially true. Watari was coming, but he was just coming to decide on an escape plan—most likely a moderately safe one which required Watari to fabricate a story to clear L of all charges…

"You know that Watari is the most boring person on this earth, don't you?"

"Please clarify your statement."

"Isn't Watari boring? Playing everything safe all the time. No risks, nothing on the line because he's got an umpteen number of backup plans for every scenario—isn't it more fun to decide on the spot? Tell me, Ryuuzaki, you agree, don't you?"

"The probability that something ends in catastrophe is ninety percent." L sighed, rather exasperated by her energy.

"That's what makes it a hell lot of fun, eh?" Xiao grinned sheepishly, "Anyway, nothing will go wrong, so long as I'm here."

"I sense an oxymoron." L arched an eyebrow when Xiao responded with a grunt and whipped out her laptop to begin typing frantically. L couldn't hold down his smile when Xiao's head popped up from behind her computer screen. The frown on her forehead told him she was one-hundred percent for real, "Give me ten minutes."

L had no say in the matter, obviously, because she didn't acknowledge his existence—or anyone else's for that matter—after she ducked down again. It must have been less than five minutes when Xiao suddenly began counting down, "Plan change. Ten, nine—"

L shuffled up without a response, making his way slowly to a guard at the door separating the visitors from the prisoners, "Excuse me officer, where is the restroom?"

Before the man had a chance to open his mouth, all the lights flashed out at once. In the windowless jailhouse, not a single spec of light could be seen. Suddenly walkie-talkies began exploding with frantic "what the hell?"s.

In the darkness, Xiao felt a hand on hers.

It took Xiao less than two steps to realize that her plan was inherently flawed. She didn't memorize a map of the place… if anything, they couldn't make it out of the place in pitch darkness because L probably didn't have any idea where to go either—"Ryuuzaki… hey, hey _L_, stop! Stop and get back behind the bars!"

"My memory serves without failure." L seemed to have read her mind and yanked harder on her hand, sending Xiao into a perpetual fall at the floor. Xiao didn't know how it was possible that her legs were moving at such speeds… it felt like she was _flying_, not running.

If he knew where he was going, that must have meant that he saw a map of this place. "By chance, how did you come upon a map of this place before you went arrested?"

Maybe it was in her head, but Xiao could have sworn that L's hand went loose for a total of two seconds before his monotonous voice responded with something unintelligible.

"Ah." Xiao suddenly smirked. She had stayed at this jail the night of her arrival, and…

Oh, _L_. So he cared for her, after all.

* * *

"I think they would stare less if you took your mask off."

"I must conceal my face regardless."

"Paranoid freak." Xiao took a savage bite of her sandwich and glanced at L's triple delight chocolate-strawberry-vanilla sundae topped with gummy worms, caramel sauce, powdered sugar, truffle and cookie bites, and white chocolate, "Is that edible?"

"I would like to double our bet."

"We can discuss this when you take off your mask. I swear, why the hell are you wearing that creepy thing? Do you know how ugly and creepy it is? For your record—" She thrust out an arm, and yanked his hand over it, "I have _goose_bumps, damn it."

L quickly retracted his hand, due to his usual germaphobic this-might-be-later-crime-scene-evidence instinct. Before he had a chance to shake of his physical contact with Xiao, however, her hand shot up from nowhere and suddenly his mask was off his face.

She stared at his bared face with a grin, "You know, masking yourself only increases the probability that you're something important. Wouldn't you rather look normal? Like me?"

"You do not look normal." L stared solemnly at his now-torn mask.

"That's okay. To the abnormal everything normal seems abnormal."

"I would like to double our bet." L repeated, now more earnestly and Xiao grinned, as if she had been expecting it, "What do you mean? It's already over—I won. Speaking of my victory, when do you plan to drop your warrant and—"

"I would like to bet again, wagering not only our previous results but also three arbitrary wishes to the winner, to be compensated absolutely by the loser." L interrupted, "The bet will concern freeing Near, Mello, and Matt from jail. I wager that I shall be faster."

"Oh, that's right, I forgot about those three disobedient mini-bastards." Xiao frowned. The two of them did run off alright, but L's three substitute-prodigies were probably now heartbroken that their dearest idol had left without them.

"Will you join the bet?" L took a gulp of his coffee, which wasn't too different from a cup of moistened sugar, "My victory results in the accumulation of six wishes, to be granted by Xiaoxiao Liang. Your victory consists of my discharging you from the Pentagon case and three wishes, to be granted by Ryuuzaki."

"To be granted by L." Xiaoxiao corrected, in case L was going to use the minute detail to his advantage later.

"Limitations to the case—the winner must lead the children out of jail by _hand_. Failure to do so is an automatic loss. In other words, if you free them without personally escorting them, your opponent has won."

"Why don't I like the sound of this?" Xiao pouted, sticking her lips out without any charm whatsoever.

"Time limitation is five hours. After reaching five hours without results, the bet will be off." L continued. Xiaoxiao wondered how long it took him to plan this one—and seeing as he had twenty-two hours of alone-time in jail, he probably used all of it to devise a plan with fifty-billion back-up plans.

This time Xiaoxiao Liang was at a major disadvantage. L had the upper hand in time, in connections, and in knowing the subjects. It might be possible that the three idiots outright refuse to let Xiao free them and consequently push the victory to L.

Actually, on that thought, Xiaoxiao could just sit around and do nothing until L has finished whatever work he needed to free the children, and then suddenly jump in and kidnap them out of jail. And if L doesn't free them on time, there would be no win or loss.

She dawdled around with the thought until L was visibly impatient and finished his coffee, "Will you bet?"

Xiaoxiao took a sip of Coke, bobbed her head aimlessly, stared out the window, fixed the wrinkles in her shirt, did something on her phone, and finally—"Five hours starts from now."

And the next thing L witnessed was a Chinese woman jumping crazily out the window next to their table. He wasn't about to say much—until he realized that the restaurant on which they stayed was on the fifth floor and—

His thumb dropped out of his mouth in horror and he quickly poked his head out of the window, expecting to see a psychotic hacker's corpse on the pavement below. After all, Xiao had the strength and agility of a toddler and would be massacred in a dodge-ball fight. Ducking out of windows, therefore, was nothing but suicidal.

However, he soon regained his composure and smiled wryly and the scene below him. As expected. It was Xiaoxiao Liang, after all.

* * *

Henry Jonsson jumped when a woman—yes—a _woman_, (he confirmed this after erasing his initial suspicion that it was a ghost from The Grudge out to get him) pounced on platform, sending the entire pulley trembling.

"What the hell are you—" Henry started, but the girl, who now he recognized with horror as the one that the TV said had Ebola, cut him off cheerfully, "What's your name, sir?"

"Don't come any closer." Henry tried to ward her off with his mop, swinging it here and there and hoping that she'd fall off his platform and die. And save him from contracting whatever nasty disease she had.

"Why not?"

"I—I—you're sick! Why aren't you in a hospital? Do you realize how—"

Her mouth tightened into a small O and she laughed, "Well, you see, the disease I have here is kind of magical."

"Don't bullshit me!"

"You would only catch what I have if I sneeze on you." She clarified, obviously stifling a grin—which Henry didn't and didn't want to understand—and clearing her throat continuously, "But you see, I don't _have _to sneeze on you. But I can, whenever and wherever I want. And if I do sneeze on you _accidentally_, since you haven't gotten the vaccine, you'll be bleeding out of your asshole, penis, ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. And even finger tips. And you'll feel your insides rotting and a worm the size of Godzilla wiggling all through your guts and poking into your lungs and you'll be vomiting shit and blood and piss through your eyes, because your eyeballs will rot—"

"I don't want to know!" Henry took a step towards the opposite end of the platform and banged against the rail. He steadied himself, though falling to death right now might be a better option than undergoing whatever the fuck it was that she just described.

"If you don't want to know, sir, you will cooperate with me on a small mission."

"What the h—" Henry shrieked like no other sonuvabitch could ever when she suddenly went ACHOO on him. He trembled, shaking from toe to the tips of his hair and he was feeling tingly all over and—oh god, oh fuck, oh fuck fuck fuck, was he going to explode now, like she said or—

She took out something from the pockets of her jeans. It was wrapped in a napkin.

A sugar cube?

Henry was sure he was spasming, because everything before him was shaking and wait, was he trembling or spasming? Oh, it didn't make a difference and what that was in her hand and ow his hand hurt and oh god he was going to die and he didn't even get to go to Florida for vacation yet and he shouldn't have taken the early shift tod—

"This here is the antidote." She crushed the sugar cube—or antidote, or whatever the hell it was—and pinched some little crystals between two fingers. Before Henry knew it, her hand had sprung out of nowhere and now there was something sweet in his mouth and…

Why the hell was she feeding him sugar?

"Feeling better?" She grinned.

Wait. Yes, he… was he calming down? Ah, yes, the trembles were going and…

"Actually, you have to take this entire thing to be completely cured."

Henry dashed forward for it, only to be pushed back by a finger. He watched, petrified, as she held the hand with the napkin and the crushed antidote over the edge of the platform, threatening to drop it if he moved a muscle.

And so Henry stood paralyzed. She smiled once again, now too generously to be pleasant, "Don't worry. I'll give you all of it if you do everything I say."

"What do you want me to do?" Henry was quavering already. Could it be that the antidote she gave him wore off already? Yes, yes he was trembling again already and now he could feel perspiration on his shirt and—

"If you screw up, though, I'll eat all of this myself. Or throw it somewhere. And you'll die just like I said, in the most painful manner ever. Did you know that this strand of virus takes four days to kill off someone, and by the time you're dead, all your internal organs will be liquefied? That's right, like soup! Stench-y tomato soup." She laughed, "Well, are you going to do what I say?"

"YES! YES OF COURSE!" He shouted, eyes wide and almost dropping to his knees.

At thirty-four years old, with no relatives and a puppy, and a history of obedience and a victim of constant bullying, Henry was now the slave of a maniac Asian woman with Ebola. Never before had he felt so suicidal in his life.

* * *

"_Yes! Yes of course!" _The man shouted, dropping to his knees with a thud that even L heard quite clearly.

L arched an eyebrow, still staring at the couple three meters below his nose. He couldn't wipe the smile off his face no matter how hard he forced himself. It was downright absurd what Xiaoxiao Liang was trying to pull off.

Xiaoxiao had jumped onto the platform of a middle-aged window-washer, who was probably trying to wipe away some pigeon shit. Within seconds she had the man from slightly indignant to petrified to unquestionably obedient. L didn't want to know how she did it, though he had to admit he was slightly curious.

After all, after she had jumped on, nothing much happened. The man had a swipe at her with his mop, and she had been motionless and simply chattered amiably. Whatever she had said, however, had the man suddenly dropping to his knees and grasping onto the fence for support. And then she held out a tissue, with something inside, and then shoved something into the man's mouth, said something else…

And suddenly the two were now being lowered onto the ground and walking off.

L smiled and returned to his coffee. Now that he had tested Xiao's abilities through the first bet—which he took as nothing more than a warm-up (though a failed one)—he was ready to begin the game. He gave a waitress his credit card for the bill, while continuing to drift farther and farther into his thoughts.

And this time, victory was surely his.

That was until, of course, the waitress returned with an apologetic smile to his table, "Sir, this card has been reported as stolen an hour ago. May we see your ID...please...?"

L's thoughts about how to brutally mutilate Xiaoxiao Liang's corpse for reporting his cards as stolen was cut off short when he read the gaze on the waitress's face. Damn it, he should have been wearing his mask. He quickly lowered his head. God, how could he have forgotten that Xiaoxiao Liang had tagged something even worse to his face than Ebola?

"Actually, it's okay, Mister. I'm also a transvestite... especially on days when my little head wouldn't think the same as my big one. I'm have to punish myself to keep disciplined…." The waitress winked, flipped her-his-her hair, "…Ryuuzaki."

L's entire face flamed a shade of red that would have sent Xiaoxiao into hell with laughter.

"Oh, I'll take care of the bill for ya! It's okay, I understand your situation." The waitress-waiter-oh god, L's head hurt, "Us minority groups gotta stick together, eh?"

And finally L understood the message that Mello delivered a day ago: "_Dear boss, for your donating Ebola onto my records, I will be donating sexual deviance onto yours. Now, slave these children around and dress quickly. Good day!"_


	7. Chapter 7: The Powers of a Transvestite

**Chapter Seven: The Powers of a Transvestite Subordinate **

* * *

**Asimo-san's corner**: Hiyo readers! Sorry for the long wait (-sigh-). This time I was kidnapped by fossils of T. Rex & Company and sent off to Jupiter to have a tea party with some aliens. Ahem.

* * *

Exactly forty-two years and seventy-nine days ago, Heath Monroe's zealous sperm swam fiercely past Janet Monroe's cervix and won first place in the four-inch dash for the almighty egg. Eight months later, Kevin Monroe was born onto earth to carry out forty-two years of unremarkable and blissful time-wasting (twenty of which were spent as a prison warden).

Yet, despite all his hard work to be un-outstanding and excellently normal, God decided to chug him down the toilet (metaphorically speaking, fortunately) after fate took a crap all over his face.

That was the only explanation for his present dilemma, Kevin decided.

Only two weeks ago, Kevin was the head security guard for the state prison. But then a mad Chinese woman, now identified as a cross-dressing sugar-thief, broke out of jail—or, more like, Kevin let him out rather publically since it seemed (it really did at the time) that the edgy person was a Chinese Peace Ambassador.

After it was revealed that there was no such thing as a Chinese Peace Ambassador, and that Kevin had just released an assault-and-robbery prisoner also charged with a four-inch thick file of other faults, Kevin was demoted into an assistant security guard.

A chance for promotion came when the police recaptured the cross-dressing-sugar-stealing-fraud. Kevin quickly volunteered to guard the man until the day of the trial.

But two hours ago the entire prison blacked out and the only prisoner of whom Kevin was in charge—Transvestite Ryuuzaki—had disappeared.

Kevin was left be bashed thoroughly by a bad-tempered sack of white, angry, fat, who also decided to suspend him from the head-guard unit permanently.

Kevin therefore retreated to guard a cell of three children. At first he comforted himself with the thought that children would be easy to take care of. After all, at six-foot-five and waxing two hundred pounds, Kevin could squash the little things with a snap.

It turned out that he couldn't have been more mistaken. The moment he stepped within proximity of the cell a blonde, flat-chested girl threatened to sling a bullet through his balls if he didn't present a box of chocolate within five minutes. And the thing was, Kevin was scared shitless just from the pair of grim blue eyes.

_So much for squashing children_, Kevin sighed to himself, as the three began re-enacting World War II with Lego forts and PSPs and rosemaries.

The worst, however, was scarcely over for Kevin Monroe.

When he returned (it was almost like a déjà vu) with a box of chocolate, suddenly the lights flickered off. _Again. _

The first thought that came across the middle aged man's mind was that perhaps he should have gotten his pulse checked. He might have recently died. After all, two blackouts just don't happen in the same day in the nation's biggest prison.

Kevin then froze mid-step, and recalling the previous catastrophe, dashed for his cell to make sure that the three midgets from hell were in place. He wasn't about to let another prisoner walk out of the place alive.

Except, by the time he had reached the metal barrier, the three had already made their way out. By the little rays of sunshine crawling through the barred windows, Kevin could make out three figures dusting themselves off carelessly as they sauntered towards the exit.

"Hurry up, Mello." The white one mumbled, staring holes into the blonde girl behind him.

"Can't you see that I'm busy, Near?" A vicious snap followed, accompanied by a glare.

"You can pick lint off your shoes later. Do you seriously desire to be caught escaping from prison?"

"The guard's already here." The one with goggles mumbled flatly, eyes still stuck on his PSP. Kevin agreed, opening his mouth to say something and kick the three of them back in their place. He felt glorious, beautifully triumphant and grand and—

The blonde one, Mello, shot a deathly glare his way.

It was seriously like a virtual bitch slap, that glare. "He's _not_ going to get in our way, Matt."

Kevin flexed his jaw speechlessly, all his two hundred pounds of muscle and masculinity melting away due to the look of doom, "Well, um actually—"

"Actually _what_? Do you _want_to get into my way?" Mello snapped, and Kevin shut up quickly, "No."

And that was the last conversation Kevin ever had in New York State Prison. He submitted his resignation letter rather voluntarily, after twenty years of service, and walked cheerfully into an asylum the next day.

* * *

"Mister Alexander," L started. If he didn't believe in bad luck before, he certainly wasn't too far from giving in now. Within two hours he had had his credit card reported stolen and subsequently gained the attention of a cross-dressing waitress, and somehow, this cross-dresser was now adamantly (and rather shamelessly) stalking him.

_If Xiaoxiao ever knew about this, she might die choking on her own laughter_, L postulated dourly.

"Alexandra. It's Alexandra." The shrill woman—man, no, _wo_man—corrected sternly, "Or Alex. Actually, just call me Alex."

"Alexand_er_, please refrain from following me any further, for otherwise I would be obligated to remove you by force." L's face flashed with a grim, exasperated frown. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate her (no, his, no her—_aish!_) paying his bill earlier, but he had already paid it back and it was just unreasonable for her to follow him all the way from New York City into the front door of the Pentagon headquarters.

"It's okay, Ryuu, no one can remove me. I'll stick with ya!"

How she managed to twist the meaning of his previous statement, L had no clue. "I would ask rather that Alexander refrain from _sticking_ to me, although I appreciate the notion."

L had several things in mind. First, he desperately needed to get rid of this Alexander, who had seen his face (despite the fact that he was wearing a mask now) and might threaten his anonymity. Then, he needed to figure out something to say to General Kim, who had called him to the Pentagon headquarters probably to beat into his skull the grave mistake L was making by taking more than a week to arrest the Hacker. After the two matters at hand, he still had a bet to win.

"Aw, but why? You see, us transvestites—" Alexander was cut off by the greeting from an approaching guard.

L turned his gaze sullenly to the approaching man. This could turn out to be a catastrophe. If the guard calls his name, then Alexander would realize that L was Ryuuzaki and would probably leak it to the press… L shook the thought out of his head and turned slowly to the guard, who saluted rather formally towards—

L couldn't believe it.

Alexander?

"Dismissed." Alexander waved casually and turned back to L, "Us transvestites, as I've said, we've got to stick together and—"

L's eyes widened when General Kim's figure swung into view. If the guard didn't recognize him, surely Kim would. "Agent Stewart and Detective L! How convenient that the two of you have already met! Come this way, then—"

L frowned, and deeper still when Alexander _dismissed _the old man, "Come on, wait your turn, you old pickle. Can't you see I'm trying to soak up a date here?"

"You're trying to date…? Heh." General Kim didn't continue, but even L's usually pastel face hinted at a blush at the old man's insinuation. Alexander blinked innocently, and then suddenly the tall blonde's face crumpled when he finally processed what the six-foot tall bag of aged anger had said a few seconds ago. "Wait, _no_—"

L itched to run.

"You're_ L_? Ryuuzaki? Ryuuzaki, the jail-breaking transvestite fraud is the world's best Detective L? Well, well now, it seems as if I'm not the only one with an identity crisis." It looked like L needed a stash of permanent markers to fix the much-too-delighted smile mushrooming on the blonde's face.

"Come inside." The old man nagged once again and, with a chuckle, Alexander swung his hand in the direction of L's buttocks.

Thankfully L had rather fast reflexes and quickly followed after General Kim, dodging the potentially awkward smack.

"Well, Detective, since you were taking quite some time on the Hacker case, I decided to provide you with an assistant." Kim pointed a languid finger at Alexander, who beamed at the attention, "Hi~ya!"

"I do not recall requesting one." L responded sullenly. Alexander was going to get into his way at best and befriend Xiao at worst.

L could imagine doomsday vividly: Alexander would force L into marrying him, then imprison Xiao forever, and Xiao would kill herself and turn into a ghost to, as she promised so many times, throttle L's precious genitalia.

"I thought you'd say that. That's fine, though. Agent Stewart's just going to investigate on his own, if you don't cooperate. But, the compensation goes to whoever captures the Hacker first." The old man grinned, flexing his fingers, "Detective, please interpret this as a competition."

"I was about to interpret it as your asking for my soul, General." L muttered sarcastically to himself and was unfortunately caught by the perpetually slap-happy Alexander, "Oh, that can definitely be arranged! Would you like to hand it over upfront in one lump sum, or in monthly installments?"

L fed a thumb into his mouth, squatting into a nearby chair and folding his knees up feebly into thinking position. Alexander stared at him, seething adoration and other disgusting sentiments, while L wondered if it would serve him better to work with or against the shameless, doggedly excited transvestite.

"Actually, it would be my honor to work with Agent Stewart."

L wanted to slap himself for admitting it, but having someone like Alexander on his side would be better than consistently working against him. Alexander noted his lack of enthusiasm, "It's funny how your voice sounds like the gutting of a cat in sync with scratching a chalkboard with iron nails, L. Very lovely transformation."

"That's settled, then. Good luck, Detective." Kim headed away, leaving L with a frantically beaming Alexander.

"I will certainly need it." L muttered to himself crossly as he surveyed the tall, lean chunk of girly manliness before him. Somehow he couldn't help himself from thinking that Kim had just tossed him into the hands of Satan.

* * *

Xiaoxiao jolt up in her seat, staring flabbergasted into the computer screen as Henry shaved a potato for dinner.

"HENRY."

"…Yes?"

"HENRY, WHY ARE MY THREE LITTLE PIGLETS GONE?"

"Well, could it be possible that you ate them? Maybe they're on bathroom break." Henry responded meekly as Xiaoxiao slammed a paw onto her keyboard and began clicking furiously with a mouse in hand.

A moment later some static filled the tense silence.

Henry put his potato down and stared at Xiao and her computer curiously. Her computer screen flashed an over-sized, narcissistic **_L_**.

Henry was beginning to wonder why the 'L' looked so familiar (he had definitely seen it somewhere in the newspaper…) when a soft cough came from the speakers. He caught Xiao looking rather flustered as she chomped on her lower lip, "Okay, L. I give."

"Huh?" Henry blinked, but was cut off by another voice from the computer speakers, "_Shall we negotiate, Xiao?_"

A second voice streamed out of the computer speakers, _"Who's that, L?"_

_"Just an acquaintance, Alexander—"_

_"Alexandra."_

_"Alexandra. Please allow Watari to escort you to your room."_

"Yes, because you've definitely given me a chance not to negotiate, L." Xiao groaned. Henry watched as she slammed her head against the table and groaned helplessly, "I admit. I've got no idea how you managed to steal them—you hacked into the system, didn't you? But how did you get them out so quickly? My computer didn't even—"

_"L! So you broke out of jail, committed fraud, robbed and assaulted, and are also a thief and a hacker?"_

_"Alexander, please go to your room."_

"L, did you adopt a child?"

_"For the record, no, Xiao. And what, exactly, did I steal and hack?"_

"You certainly enjoy rubbing this into my face, L, you hunchbacked pimp." Xiao groaned, head-desking again.

_"Oh, you certainly don't need to rub _that_ into her face! Hey, hey you, Miss Xiao—trust me, I understand what you're going through. But L's but a bad guy, you know, so keep going at it! Because, if you give up, I'll certainly take him!"_

Henry stared in confusion at Xiao, who stared in confusion at the humongous letter on her computer screen. From the little Xiao shared with Henry, he could make out that the Chinese madwoman had a bet with a certain Ryuuzaki (which he assumed to be this L here) to break three children out of jail.

It seemed that she had just lost the bet, since her 'three little pigs' were 'stolen'. But what was this with the two people on the other line? Ryuuzaki and his girlfriend, maybe?

An awkward silence diffused through the room, which was filled up with a continuous rant from the speakers—"_He really _is_obstinate, isn't he? I'm so jealous of you, Xiao. How did you ever manage to get him to steal your heart? Well, he's already stolen mine, but he's also breaking it mercilessly…"_

_"Alexander, please back away from the microphone."_

_"L, let me talk to her! Jeez, you just don't understand girls, do you?"_

"Um, L…" Xiao attempted to say something, but was cut off with the sound of static and what sounded like struggling from the speakers. A second later the screen blacked out. Xiao turned to Henry, looking as if someone had just slugged her in the face, "Keep shaving your damned potato, or I'll sand off your nipples with my fingernails."

* * *

"You should've let me talk to her, L! You cold bastard, you." Alexander huffed, squeezing his hips with two hands as he glared stubbornly at the exhausted man before him, "Your poor ex! I can just imagine what she's going through—"

"I must profess, however, that you certainly do not." L sighed.

This was going to take a while.

"Yes, I do. I totally do. I, like, so, like, totally, like, do. O-kay? Just hand her to me. I'll mend your bond in no time, promise. I'm super good at this stuff, and I'll do it as a favor to you because you're my partner and everything." Alexander beamed, waving a nail-filer dramatically as he propped a leg up on L's laptop.

L didn't even bother correcting that Alexander was a _subordinate_. He dropped another sugar cube into his coffee, which already had the consistency of sand, and peered up at the blonde. "I will deal with her on my own."

"Look at how you've dealt with her! She didn't say a single thing in your favor, did she? She even told you to stop rubbing stuff in her face, too, so she must be sick and tired of you trampling all over—"

"L!"

"Stop being so noisy, Mello. My cochlea is protesting the high frequency."

"Shut up, Near, I can be as noisy as I want to be!"

_"Beep. Beep. Congratulations, you've passed level three!" _

L's mind stopped dead in its tracks and turned slowly, as its owner practically fell off his chair at the sight of the trio who had banged open the door before him. "How did the three of you—?"

"Strange, isn't it?" Mello gazed into L's face with the sort of doe-like expression that sent L's insides crawling. Matt nodded, glancing up every now and then at L's empty expression, "Yes, we broke out of jail and it upset him for some reason."

"Oh, m'ai g-a-w-d. The two of you have children, too! How could you have treated the mother of your children that way?"

L ignored Alexander's proclamation and made his way back into his seat.

Everything was completely out of hand. First he was threatened into adopting this idiot as a subordinate. And then this idiot drives his negotiations with Xiao into the gutter (god knows what Xiao had concluded from the previous discussion). And now he had lost the bet with the most merciless hacker on the planet (without being aware that he had lost it), without a chance to even negotiate the loss. And what's more, he didn't even notice the presence of three noise-boxes in the building until they slammed open his door.

God knows what else he had missed.

"Who are you?" Mello narrowed an eye at Alexander. L was about to open his mouth to explain, when Alexander cut L off by cheerfully stuffing a hand in his face, "I'm his new girlfriend! Don't worry, little boys, I'm okay with skirt-flips, but you should beware that sometimes I forget to wear my panties…"

"Oh." Near deadpanned at the brilliant introduction and turned on his heels to find Watari.

"Is it just me, or has L gotten more promiscuous?" Matt mumbled, as he followed behind the albino and Mello (who was busy shooting death glares at Alexander) into the reading room.

"Was that inappropriate?" Alexander turned towards L, a look of concern floating over his face.

L fell flat onto the floor with his cup of coffee and didn't climb up again.

* * *

Xiaoxiao trampled up the last case of stairs at two o'clock in the morning, with Henry out of breath behind her. She hadn't meant to come home, but it so happened that L left her no choice. She leaned against the railing and stared murderously at Henry, "You."

"Me?" He looked immediately as if he was about to fall back down the stairs.

"Yes. Who are you?"

"Henry Jonsson."

"What's our relationship?"

"Um—"

"You're my boyfriend, of course."

"Boyfriend?"

"Yes, boyfriend. If you dare to say anything otherwise, I'll rip you another arsehole and take your antidote with my afternoon tea so that you can bleed to death out of every orifice and I'll chuck your bloodless corpse to the meat factory and have you ground into sausages for breakfast. _Compris_?"

"Uh, yes." Henry shook nervously as Xiao swung around on one foot and knocked on the door with a politeness and reverence which the American did not expect.

"_What?" _The door swung open to the scowl of the century. Henry indeed did fall off the stairs and rolled to a stop a few steps below. The conversation above continued merrily without him:

"I'm really, truly, deeply sorry for interrupting your beauty sleep."

"Why, ambassador, how do you do?"

Henry witnessed a meek smile from Xiao as he crawled up slowly.

"Well um—"

"Would you like to lodge in this modest place? It might not compare well to jail, or the world's greatest detective L's hotel room. And who the _hell_ is that?" The blonde woman shot an unfriendly glare his direction and immediately Henry was about to drop down the stairs again. That was until Xiao stopped him with one hand (which Henry jumped at), "He's my boyfriend. Leila, meet Henry."

A sadistic grin covered the blonde woman's face, "Oh, is that so? Did something go terribly wrong?"

"No, actually—" Xiao snorted sarcastically, "This is _exactly_ how I planned to end up."


	8. Chapter 8: Operation Whorehouse Central

**Chapter Eight: Operation Whorehouse Central  
**

* * *

Hello, world :D A couple of things brought to you from Asimo-san:

1. I apologize deeply for neglecting this story for months. I will take my rightful punishment, whatever it is.

2. I've decided to re-write the last two chapters of this story (starting with this one) by tweaking the plot and whatnot, as it was way too complicated and elusive before.

3. Thanks for your support and readership, as always

4. Sorry for the onslaught of run-on sentences from hell. Anyway, I'll be sure to add periods onto my grocery list next time.

* * *

It had been a week. Normally, L would have adjusted to a new environment within minutes, depending on the extremity of the situation. But for some reason, he just couldn't bring himself to accept the existence of his flamboyantly perky subordinate even after seven days.

Yes, the flamboyantly perky ball of godknowswhat doom which seemed to have fallen right through the sky and into his arms, just like a load of bird shit. This load of bird shit had insisted on calling itself Alexandra, despite owning a penis of probably hideous size. But that aside, L had to admit that he admired the transvestite a tad for his self-confidence. There were many people out there proud of cross-dressing, but no more than two who would blatantly show it off to the most conservative of people and shove something up the said people's behinds when, expectedly, the said people find his manners slightly disturbing.

Then again, Alexander was one of a kind.

A rare, rare kind.

"I get the slightest feeling that Ryuu doesn't love me very much." Alexander chattered on and off, quite amiably, in a completely one-sided conversation with his black-haired boss, who lobbed back with a barely intelligible "Really now—" before getting cut off.

"Could it be that I'm simply too sentimental for you? Of course, anyone with a pulse would be too sentimental for a zombie." After pushing an exasperated sigh from his lips, as if L was a rebellious teenage son and _he_ was the detective's over-taxed mother, Alexander leaned forward with a small sparkle of curiosity in his eye, "Is there anyone that you really _do_ like? Is there? No, huh? I knew it."

L stared flatly ahead until the blonde pulled away with all interests extinguished.

Alexander was much more than what L had bargained for. In fact, the detective didn't bargain for anything at all; the maniacally narcissistic cross-dresser before him wasn't too dissimilar from a spurt of pigeon shit which sailed, against all odds, onto his head, "I would rather Alexander refrain from abusing truth with conjectures and unfounded prejudice."

The blonde cheerfully ignored the man before him for his manicured fingernails, "Maybe I should have chosen a lighter shade of pink. This fuchsia really makes me feel needy. I'm not needy, am I, Ryuu? I'm not, right? I'm very popular with the boys..."

L's look had Alexander scrambling to rephrase, "_You_'re just sexually repressed, Ryuu. Weird. Bizzare. Peculiar. You're just _odd_. That's why you aren't head over heels for me and begging for me to carry your child, on your knees right now. Isn't it? Isn't it?"

At this point L knew that it served his ear drums better to just go along with it. "One of the many reasons."

"I feel like we're hitting a wall, Ryuu. Where is that mysteriously handsome, albeit creepy, cross-dresser who wasn't able to take his eyes off from me? Where did all our energy go? All our love?" Cries of pain began slashing into the air like bad calligraphy; L couldn't help but flinch at the noise, "Please refrain from raising your voice, Alexander."

"Alexand_ra_," Alexander corrected spontaneously, "So, Ryuu, I think it's better that we end this relationship before I hurt you any more."

L blinked, attempting to swallow his coffee and digest the words at once. Unsurprisingly enough, it turned out to be an utter failure as L rolled out of his chair, hacking very uncharacteristically of his monotonous self.

The power of a transvestite, indeed, was rather intimidating. L scrambled slowly as Alexander regarded him out of a pair of pitying eyes, "I'm sorry, Ryuu. It's been fun, but we ought to move on. Let's break up without tears."

L grazed Alexander's face with his calculating stare as he tried reading exactly what could have been passing through the unpredictable man's head.

At the unaffected expression drawing over the man's face, Alexander gave up his act in a cold explicit manner, "I know you already know who the hacker is, L."

L brought his knees closer to his chest and stared at the man in interest, "And…?"

"And the fact that we've dawdled around doing nothing for a week means that you aren't willing to capture the hacker or share with me any information regarding him. I, being an agent with morals, will not betray my partner—so I can't submit you to the Pentagon. But I, being a human, won't let you drag me down—so I'll simply quit working with you."

"I must commend you regarding your wise decision." L took a sip of his coffee and stared into the air tentatively, "But I indeed do not know the identity of the hacker."

"Of course you don't."

For some reason, the tone of increasingly icy Alexander's voice made L slightly uncomfortable. There was a bit more to the transvestite than L had foreseen. He was letting on much less than he actually knew.

L felt his heart sailing slowly towards his stomach as he considered the possibility more deeply, trying to map events and motives and characters into a logical map. And when he did, he came to the realization that both he and Xiao had been entrapped in yet another delicate situation. Except this time, much more than their pride and a few lines of mockery were up for grabs.

If Xiao was here, she would've said something along the lines of, "Boy, we're in deep shit here, aren't we?"

And L would have full-heartedly agreed. The detective made a firm vow to himself never to walk near another transvestite ever again.

* * *

Xiaoxiao Liang narrowed her already undersized eyes when an unexpected '9' popped up amongst the pool of Sans Serif, bold grey code her in which her mouse swam.

"...the hell?"

She could only recall hacking into the high school reunion party of menopausal old men sporting donut bellies (better known as The Pentagon) _seven_ times total. So why was it that the files insisted that she had visited _nine_ times? It wasn't that she wasn't a fan of reaping undeserved credit, but adding another two counts of 'intentional disruption of confidential governmental operations' onto her five-foot thick stack of offenses wasn't exactly her favorite pastime.

It was only a side-note that she also had the world's best detective on her back.

Unless, of course, if she wasn't the only person who could come and go into the Pentagon's computer networks at will... then there would then be a very rightful owner of the extra two visits.

But if that wasn't the case, Xiao was left confronting the slightly revolting possibility that she had grown so needy of the Spartan geezers as to subconsciously visit them at night. On _two _different occasions.

Xiao traced the tip of her nose with an index finger, deep in thought, while Henry and Leila badmouthed her happily in the background (having finally found something in common).

"She's so uncouth, isn't she? For the love of god, it remains a fact that she beats Olympic sprint records when confronted with a bottle of shampoo!"

To the sound of Henry's voice Xiao flinched in disdain. The middle-aged geezer wasn't too different from a female fox entrapped in a penis-wielding stack of _creme de la dipshit_. Once he detected that Xiao was more afraid of Leila than he was of Xiao, he jumped ship to Leila. Nowadays he was inseparable from the English detective, even if Xiao threatened to eat all of his sugary antidote. "Of course," the she-male fox would sprout, "you'd give it to me if Leila told you to."

Sure, Xiao saw it coming. Henry, who hated her with his life, probably couldn't wait to take refuge within the lukewarm threats of her best friend. Leila, who would kill if that was what it took to make her Asian punching-bag even a single bit more miserable, probably adopted Henry without a qualm.

Xiao half-heartedly wanted to protest their accusations, but backed down because what they said was mostly true. Really true. Moreover, she could imagine any objection she tries to hurl Leila's way being shredded to pieces in a cookie-cutter fashion by the English detective's mechanical logic. The ostracized Chinese woman resigned to her laptop with a dull sigh, spreading her hands flat over the keyboard while gazing sheepishly into the screen. A few meters behind her, Leila shared excitedly all of Xiao's less-than-intelligent habits (singing in the shower, pretending her room was a Star Trek battleship, getting fired from McDonalds for-crying-out-loud).

Xiao again grew half a mind to prove the blonde wrong (by advertising how she had been hacking into the most secured place on earth), though she could also see Leila hanging her for the act before recognizing the genius it takes to do so... and therefore backed down.

Her quickly fleeing attention was yanked back into place when her computer screen began flashing red. Xiao stared at the chunk of metal and plastic for minutes, wondering why the hell it flashing red, of all things. She faintly recalled having programmed a function to drive her computer screen red if it had ever been intruded upon—

At the time that she pieced together the function, she had believed that she would be very pleasantly surprised when the time came for it run. She had considered herself a lonely genius, and had looked forward to finally being challenged by someone worthy. The belief was mostly due to her naivety and pure thoughts about the lack of evil people in the world, which was completely ruined and trampled down within minutes of having met L.

At the current moment, however, Xiao was really beginning to wish that she hadn't gotten herself fired from McDonald's. After all, there were only so many possibilities as to who would have both the motive and the devices to trespass her turf... none of which were good.

L and Watari wouldn't do—their self-righteous, dogmatic ways would never allow them to savor the irony of sneaking into the property of a bona fide hacker. Plus, if L had wanted to contact her, he usually would conceitedly pull a one-way video call with a narcissistic, oversized rendition of his name. And if L didn't, neither would his three little groupies, who would probably bitch fight a few millenniums over a piece of chocolate-stained pajamas before paying Xiao any mind.

After eliminating five people, the rest of the world was divided neatly up into two categories: they were either with the Pentagon (and out to ruin her), or they weren't (and still out to ruin her). But Xiao realized that the Pentagon would never possess anyone of such talents—otherwise, why would they so grudgingly hire L, who was practically a bank-robber in disguise when it came to charging for his services?

Xiao stared at her computer screen with disdain and barked, "Liang the Second, I see. Just wait 'till I get my hands on you, poser. Betcha didn't know I was a sadistic pimp."

As if on cue, files begin popping onto her computer screen from the middle of nowhere. Windows closed and opened on their own rapidly, one after another and completely out of control. She had seen the exact scene so many times and knew the exact codes which manipulated it, down to the very letter.

Yet despite the eerie familiarity, it was the first time that she was seeing it on her _own_ computer. She felt slightly like a surgeon having an open-heart surgery at full consciousness.

And to tell the truth, it was only _slightly_ horrifying.

Still, she feigned to be in-control, mainly by popping jelly-beans at life-threatening rates. The candy robbing, as expected, caught the eyes of the two new-found-friends behind her.

"Oh, it looks like your computer caught a virus!" Henry observed as he peered into her computer screen, "Do you download a lot of games and movies or something? My cousin did, and jeez, his computer went crazy."

Leila's follow up couldn't have been faster. "She must have. Xiao, what did I tell you about—"

Xiaoxiao groaned. Here she was, a master of technology dying of a panic attack due to a slightly humongous possibility that the very invader wiggling into her personal space was the exact same one sneaking around the Pentagon…and two computer-illiterate commoners were trying to lecture _her_ about the workings of a computer virus?

She felt like a human being instructed by two prehistoric apes on how to crack open a walnut.

Jesus fucking Christ, the lecherously ridiculous scene!

And, needless to say, in a crisis like this one, the first thing that came to mind was L: she needed him.

It was only an afterthought that asking for help from a detective who couldn't be happier with her mashed and cremated might have been a somewhat silly idea.

"Oh, you don't have to look afraid! I'm sure it's just a normal virus… here, let me see, I'm pretty good at this stuff." Henry lent a chubby hand.

"Shoo, shoo." Xiao swapped it away dismissively as she marched off onto the porch, laptop in one hand. She needed to first deal with the hacker.

Who he was, what he wanted, how he wanted it—she would deal with those after thoroughly stripping him naked of his firewall and puncturing every internal organ of his laptop with her codes.

The hacker needed at least three more minutes to break her firewall. She could walk to the porch in a minute, and then crush the life out of his codes in thirty seconds—which left ninety seconds to spare… which meant she had fifty percent of the allotted time for errors. And honestly, Xiao couldn't imagine how a genius like her could make an error worthy of ninety-seconds.

That was before, of course, she slid open the porch door to a bent silhouette.

She was surprised her laptop was still in hand (and not in broken pieces on the floor) as her jaw dropped nearly to the ground, "Ohmifriggingaw—"

Her eyes widened to disproportionate sizes when the tip of L's germaphobic finger brushed against her lower lip tentatively. For a second she wondered if he was asking for a virtual blow-job; thankfully she realized that he had only meant to shush her.

"Hello." He peered into her face with his pair of dead-owl eyes and shut the door behind the two of them, "I propose going to the café to continue our conversation. It is a place with a commendable repertoire of pastries."

Xiao groaned at the mention of "pastries", about to cross her arms and take the sugar-fiend on, when she realized that she had a greater problem at hand: there was someone molesting her baby. Without another thought she pointed at the lawn three floors below, "Get down there first and we'll discuss whatever later."

He didn't look at all fazed, which, though expected, was slightly disorienting nonetheless: "Unfortunately my offer must only hold now."

"Can't you see I'm busy?" Xiao snapped, gesturing to her half-open computer.

L scrubbed one foot with the other. "To the contrary…"

"L, just shut the fuck up and jump." Xiao jabbed a finger to the lawn below irritably, "It's only two floors. Knowing your agility, the most you'll get is a severed spine."

A victorious smile surfaced on one end of L's lips: "For your reference, Xiao, I am recording every word you say. And that command which you had just issued may be severe enough to earn you quite some years in jail."

"If you don't leave me alone right now, I'll…" Xiao narrowed her eyes, realizing that she had, in fact, ran out of threats, "I'll do something very nasty to your testicles."

"I would very much like to witness your concept of 'very nasty'."

Xiao groaned glanced at her watch. She had less than twenty seconds left. Without another thought she flipped open her laptop cover and began typing frantically.

The Asian didn't even realize that L had began scooting the chair, on which she perched, with complete ease. She was beginning to feel overwhelmed as commands and windows overlapped and amplified one another. Xiao stared, horrified, into her computer screen as her guts shouted up to her brain; her brain issued billions of contradicting commands down to her fingers at once; in response her fingers drove holes into her keys. Her entire body, soon enough, began was under a debate fierce enough to have any English parliament giggle with glee.

But it wasn't her only problem, for L had actually taken advantage of her dilemma to push her—rather naturally—down a trolley connecting the porch and the lawn.

"GOD!" Xiao snapped, shooting to her feet, eyes brazen with anger. Before her, the fragile, over-worked computer finally shut down on its own, succumbed to the hands of conquer and defeat.

She had just lost.

Xiaoxiao Liang, at the ripe age of twenty-one, had just been _hacked_.

It was the only sentence her brain couldn't register correctly. It just made no sense. She, the self-proclaimed world's best hacker, had just been hacked?

She stood up from her chair, about to jam her fingers in one of his orifices—she wasn't too fussy, at this point in time, regarding which one—when she realized that she was stepping on grass.

It took her a few more seconds to register the fact that, while she was busy dueling a hacker, L had taken the chance to carry her off onto the lawn below the porch.

She twisted her head up to face L, the bastard who had just driven her into her first defeat. However, in his place she saw the face of a woman…

Who, upon closer examination, was a— _No._

"That was really something!" The man, with face caked in makeup, beamed cheerfully, "But, I have to say, if Ryuu-dear hadn't distracted you, I wouldn't have been able to trash you like that. Really. Well, at least not so easily. "

Xiao considered the possibility that she had died from shock and was now in heaven, which was currently trending cross-dressing angels: "Who the hell are you?"

L cut to the chase, "This is Alexander—

("Alexand_ra_," the man corrected.)

"—Stewart, my assistant in the Pentagon Hacker case." L explained, turning to Stewart slowly, as if it was more difficult spooning out his eyes than taking one glance at the transvestite, "Alexander, this is Xiaoxiao Liang, an_ anti_-virus developer."

Xiaoxiao narrowed her eyes slowly at L. This couldn't have been heaven. No heaven could allow something as strange-looking as L an entrance, anyway.

"Is something out of place?" L inquired when he noticed the confusion in Xiao's eyes.

She had been practicing retorts to whatever would come out of L's mouth if he had seen her again since the lost bet. If he asked about her wellbeing, she would crack an immature sex joke. If he read a warrant, she would crack an immature sex joke. If he hollered to her from a megaphone off a jet while she was surrounded by police cars, she would find a megaphone and holler back an immature sex-joke, mainly about his being a transvestite.

But now that there was already a real transvestite there…

Xiao arched an eyebrow, turning to Alexander, "Do you like immature sex jokes about Ryuuzaki?"

L cut in to his own rescue, "We are here to discuss the possibility of erasing his position as my subordinate, in terms of changing computer records. Since he is the only partner the Pentagon assigned to me, it should not be too much a problematic task, as you have no witnesses to take into account. The task requires merely hacking into the Pentagon and changing a few records."

"And why should I?" Xiao turned to Alexander, "You, sir, just molested my baby. What makes you think I'll stop you from being sucked dry of all your sanity and bodily juices by this creep here? I wanna tell you a perverted joke about Ryuuzaki first, though."

L cut in again, "That, Xiao, we have already planned. Alexander—

("Alexan_dra_!")

"—had made several copies of evidence documenting your illegally pirating things from your computer while you were within the borders of the United States of America. As the crimes had been committed there, the British government is not liable to protect you, and you will be at the mercy of the FBI. It seems that the most current fine for pirating is fifty thousand dollars."

"How the hell-" Xiao started, and was cut off by Alexandra's happy chuckle, "You got hacked, remember?"

Xiao pretended not to have heard the humiliating words, "Well, since I'm currently kidnapped, did you know that the charge for kidna—"

"Actually," Alexander smiled gleefully. Xiaoxiao really couldn't tell whose side the man was on, "Actually, you see, as we're both governmental agents, this is not a kidnapping."

Xiao stared into the pair of flashy green orbs threateningly and looked away as soon as she realized that his eyes were much harder than she anticipated. He was a formidable opponent. And he wasn't on her side.

She knocked her ankles together, wryly considering all that had gone on. It made no sense. Were the two even working together?

First of all, if Alexander was working with L, surely he would have seen through L's lie about her being an anti-virus developer. Therefore, either he wasn't working with L, or he was—but with some complications. After all, if L had already told him all there was to be known about Xiao, surely he didn't need to introduce Xiao (and Xiao would have understood from the implications what position she was in) again.

But L did introduce her, and purposefully under the wrong title. It must have meant that the two were not corroborating at all. If Alexander was working with L, he must have had ulterior rewards to reap from helping L retrieve her dead body—which wasn't to her benefit. And he must have known that L didn't trust him, having ignored that lie before so easily, and was confident enough to proceed without L's help. That must have meant that he had a gloat-worthy plan already in progress. If Alexander wasn't working with L, he probably wasn't working for Xiao's well-being either.

In both cases, Xiao decided, Alexander wasn't on her side.

Moreover, L wouldn't suddenly just pick up an _assistant_. His three groupies were enough to keep all of the civilized world's police agencies busy. Plus, if the Pentagon had genuinely wanted help, they would usually provide teams—not solo agents. The fact that L had fabricated such an obvious lie (anyone keeping up with the news would realize that Xiaoxiao Liang had a face twin to the one broadcasted for having Ebola) before her meant that he _wanted_ her to notice that Alexander wasn't working with him.

Could it really be an indirect call for help?

Well, it was either that or the two of them were together to eliminate her to start with—and all of this was an act. In fact, this new alternative was much more logical. After all, the two of them had teamed up to blackmail her: L distracted her while Alexander hacked into her laptop, an act preformed with fluidity of pros. To boot, L had motive: Xiao lost the last bet to him and owed him quite a bit, after all.

Xiao believed much more easily that L had simply came to trick her than came to ask for help. But the man looked genuine enough. Then again, he just looked the same as he always did, with the expressionless face and marble eyes. Still, there were only three possible options: L wanted her dead, L wanted her half-dead and in jail, or L wanted her alive enough to help him out of a jiffy, and then dead.

Grudgingly Xiaoxiao swung towards Alexander, "Forget it, I don't want..."

To her surprise, Alexander drew a pistol from his side and (here she took two quick steps backwards and stared with alarm at L-) dropped it on the ground, falling on his knees in the process. Xiao stared in surprise as he looked up at her with near-watering eyes, "I'd like to be your computer. To be raped by your majestic hands."

The smile on Xiao's face dropped in a beat, "Who the hell are you kidding?"

"You only have three choices, Xiao." L spoke slowly, as if he had been rehearsing the speech, "One—you do as we say. Two—you physically and mentally overwhelm the two of us within thirty-seven seconds."

"And three?"

"Three—you physically and mentally overwhelm the two of us within thirty-seven seconds, and _then _do as we say."

Before Xiao knew it Alexander had somehow slipped behind her and, in a flash, had her hands cuffed behind her back. L continued rather comfortably, as if things were going just as planned. "Let's now take a trip to the café, to discuss our plans."

"I don't see how this is a discussion." Xiao pouted dramatically, sticking her lips out in the most immature and downright disgusting fashion as Alexander dragged her towards Watari's limousine, "Ow, Alexander, do you _have_ to man-handle me? Can't you see that I'm as delicate as glass here?"

She could have sworn she caught an offhandedly evil smirk on Alexander's face for no reason. The smirk had her heart exploding jittery sparks of fear. There really was something wrong with the present situation. Everything was odd and out of place. There were too many questions and not a single answer.

Why did L lie? Why didn't Alexander react to the lie? Was L trying to insinuate something? Was he trying to say that he was going to arrest her for real, or was he saying that he needed her help? Or was it all a plot before the moment she first met him in Leila's apartment?

And who, really, was this Alexander? Why did he agree to work with L? What was his connection to the Pentagon? What did he want from her? What_ could_ he want from her?

And, most importantly, why were the two of them making her hack into the Pentagon on their behalf? It couldn't have been a coincidence; especially not so for L, who knew that Xiao was the Pentagon Hacker. Was this just another way to arrest her? But why was L, who had so many times insinuated that he didn't want her to be arrested and could have arrested her long ago, going along with it? Plus, the action was an offense even for governmental agents—they would be arrested as her accomplices, if she were to be caught.

Why were they taking that risk? But L didn't take risks. So was there no risk at all?

Xiao chewed her lower lip slowly as she attempted sorting out all the millions of questions mushrooming inside her quickly liquefying brain. Was her relationship with L—the hide and seek, the semi-lunatic bets—a trap set by the detective to capture her trust…? Was he with her at all, during all those previous weeks?

Who _was _L?

"What are you looking so abstract for?" Alexander stabbed her side with a finger, and before she was able to say much, quickly posed another question, "What should we call this secret mission of ours?"

Xiao stared into Alexander's eyes pensively. It could have been that L had been working with a much bigger team, of which Alexander was a member, since the beginning. Then the game might have just begun. Or was it that a game had just ended, and had now brought her into the next level?

Yes, a new level wouldn't be too much of a surprise. She had just uncovered another hacker into the Pentagon, and coincidentally just minutes before getting 'kidnapped' by L and a stranger. And now she had been forced into taking up a job that, for some reason, made no sense.

"… whore…"

Xiao jerked up at the word, "Eh?"

"I am sadly disappointed at confirming that the word would actually catch your attention." L's voice chained Xiao down the reality. The madwoman blinked rapidly, prying at the half-repressed grin on Alexander's face in confusion. The transvestite held up a flat palm before L's nose, "C'mon, pitch it over. Two bucks." and L grudgingly placed a small lollipop there.

Xiao blinked, still confused over exactly what the two had bet over, "What?"

"We're going to call it 'Operation Whorehouse Central!' Sexy, no?" Alexander smirked, obviously pleased.

Somehow, just hearing the name made Xiao quite a bit happier. And the fact made her slightly worried for her own well-being, "Only if I'm the pimp."


End file.
